LLaMA 3.1 8B Environmental Impact
Most popular small open-source model for fine-tuning and deployment
- Architecture
- Dense Transformer (decoder-only)
- Parameters
- 8B
- Context
- 128,000 tokens
- Provider
- Meta
Energy per query
0.30 Wh
about the same as a Google search (0.3 Wh)
CO2 per query
0.12 g
Global Average grid (475 gCO₂/kWh)
Water per query
1 mL
~909 queries to fill 1 litre
Processing location
Self-hosted (varies)
Provider
Meta
Category
Text / Chat
Grid carbon intensity
475 g CO2/kWh (27% renewable)
How does LLaMA 3.1 8B compare?
Detailed Breakdown
Energy Consumption
LLaMA 3.1 8B is the most widely deployed open-source model, used as a base for thousands of fine-tunes. At ~0.3 Wh per query, it's efficient enough to run on a single consumer GPU. Its 128K context window at this size makes it uniquely versatile for self-hosting.
Power Source & Carbon
As an open-source model, energy impact depends entirely on deployment location. Popular cloud hosts include AWS, GCP, Azure, and specialised providers like Together AI and Fireworks. Meta's own data centres run approximately 60% on renewable energy.
Water Usage
At ~1.1 mL per query, LLaMA 3.1 8B's water footprint is minimal. Self-hosted on consumer hardware, water consumption drops to effectively zero.
About LLaMA 3.1 8B
LLaMA 3.1 8B is an open-source text and chat model from Meta, released in July 23, 2024, that runs well below the category average for energy consumption at 0.30 Wh per query. Because its weights are publicly available, it can be self-hosted on any infrastructure — meaning its carbon footprint depends entirely on where and how you choose to run it. At 8B parameters, it most popular small open-source model for fine-tuning and deployment.
These figures are estimates derived from hardware specifications and API benchmarks — Meta has not published official energy data for LLaMA 3.1 8B. Actual consumption may vary significantly depending on batching, quantisation, and infrastructure optimisations that we cannot observe from outside.
Key Insights
Meta LLaMA Family
How energy efficiency has evolved across versions.
What does your LLaMA 3.1 8B usage cost the planet?
Use our calculator to estimate your personal environmental footprint based on how often you use LLaMA 3.1 8B.
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How much energy does LLaMA 3.1 8B use per query?
Each LLaMA 3.1 8B query consumes approximately 0.30 Wh of energy. This is about the same as a traditional Google search (~0.3 Wh).
What is LLaMA 3.1 8B's carbon footprint?
Based on the carbon intensity of Self-hosted (varies), each query produces approximately 0.12 g of CO2. The grid in this region has a carbon intensity of 475 g CO2/kWh with 27% renewable energy.
How much water does LLaMA 3.1 8B use?
Each query consumes approximately 1 mL of water, primarily used for cooling the data centers that process the request.
How does LLaMA 3.1 8B compare to a Google search?
A LLaMA 3.1 8B query uses about the same as a Google search in terms of energy. A Google search uses approximately 0.3 Wh, while LLaMA 3.1 8B uses 0.30 Wh.
Technical Details
Architecture
Dense Transformer (decoder-only)
Parameters
8B
Context window
128,000 tokens
Release date
2024-07-23
Open source
Yes
Training data cutoff
2024-06