o1-mini Environmental Impact
Smaller, faster reasoning model optimised for STEM tasks
- Architecture
- Transformer with chain-of-thought reasoning
- Context
- 128,000 tokens
- Provider
- OpenAI
Energy per query
3.0 Wh
10x more than a Google search (0.3 Wh)
CO2 per query
1.3 g
US East (Virginia) grid (450 gCO₂/kWh)
Water per query
12 mL
~83 queries to fill 1 litre
Processing location
Azure US East / Sweden
Provider
OpenAI
Category
Text / Chat
Grid carbon intensity
450 g CO2/kWh (25% renewable)
How does o1-mini compare?
Detailed Breakdown
Energy Consumption
o1-mini is a smaller reasoning model optimised for STEM tasks like maths and coding. At ~3 Wh per query, it uses roughly 80% less energy than the full o1 model while retaining strong reasoning capabilities for focused domains.
Power Source & Carbon
Runs on Microsoft Azure infrastructure. Its smaller size allows more efficient GPU utilisation than the full o1 model.
Water Usage
At ~12 mL per query, o1-mini uses significantly less water than o1 but still more than standard chat models due to reasoning overhead.
About o1-mini
o1-mini is a text and chat model from OpenAI, released in September 12, 2024. Smaller, faster reasoning model optimised for STEM tasks. Each query uses 3.0 Wh of energy and produces 1.3 g of CO₂. That's 10x the energy of a Google search — reflecting the computational demands of text and chat.
These figures are estimates derived from hardware specifications and API benchmarks — OpenAI has not published official energy data for o1-mini. Actual consumption may vary significantly depending on batching, quantisation, and infrastructure optimisations that we cannot observe from outside.
o1-mini in Context
Your yearly o1-mini footprint
At 25 queries per day, your annual o1-mini usage consumes 27.4 kWh — roughly what a fridge uses in a month. That produces 11.9 kg of CO₂.
What does your o1-mini usage cost the planet?
Use our calculator to estimate your personal environmental footprint based on how often you use o1-mini.
Calculate My ComputeFrequently Asked Questions
How much energy does o1-mini use per query?
Each o1-mini query consumes approximately 3.0 Wh of energy. This is 10x more than a traditional Google search (~0.3 Wh).
What is o1-mini's carbon footprint?
Based on the carbon intensity of Azure US East / Sweden, each query produces approximately 1.3 g of CO2. The grid in this region has a carbon intensity of 450 g CO2/kWh with 25% renewable energy.
How much water does o1-mini use?
Each query consumes approximately 12 mL of water, primarily used for cooling the data centers that process the request.
How does o1-mini compare to a Google search?
A o1-mini query uses 10x more than a Google search in terms of energy. A Google search uses approximately 0.3 Wh, while o1-mini uses 3.0 Wh.
Technical Details
Architecture
Transformer with chain-of-thought reasoning
Context window
128,000 tokens
Release date
2024-09-12
Open source
No
Training data cutoff
2024-10