Sora Environmental Impact
10-second video generation — extremely energy intensive
Per query = One 10-second video clip
Energy per query
500.0 Wh
CO2 per query
225.0 g
Water per query
1.85 L
Processing location
Azure US East / Sweden
Provider
OpenAI
Category
Video Generation
Grid carbon intensity
450 g CO2/kWh (25% renewable)
How does Sora compare?
Detailed Breakdown
Energy Consumption
Sora consumes approximately 500 Wh per 10-second video clip — our mid-range estimate between the WSJ figure of 20-100 Wh and the Alexander (2025) upper bound of 1,000 Wh (1 kWh). This is roughly 1,650x more energy than a standard text query. Video generation requires running a diffusion transformer model across both spatial and temporal dimensions, generating coherent frames at high resolution. Each video may require multiple NVIDIA H100 GPUs running for several minutes. Energy use quadruples when video length doubles.
Power Source & Carbon
Sora runs on Microsoft Azure's GPU clusters, likely requiring dedicated high-density compute nodes with multiple H100 GPUs per video. The extreme power density required for video generation means these workloads are concentrated in Azure's largest data centers. Microsoft's overall electricity consumption nearly tripled between 2020 and 2024, reaching 29.8 million MWh.
Water Usage
At approximately 1,850 mL (~1.85 liters) per 10-second video, Sora's water consumption is substantial — equivalent to a large bottle of water per clip. This is a direct consequence of the extreme GPU compute time and the resulting heat that must be dissipated through cooling systems. Generating just 10 short videos would consume over 18 liters of water.
What does your Sora usage cost the planet?
Use our calculator to estimate your personal environmental footprint based on how often you use Sora.
Calculate My ComputeFrequently Asked Questions
How much energy does Sora use per query?
Each Sora query consumes approximately 500.0 Wh of energy. This is 1667x more than a traditional Google search (~0.3 Wh).
What is Sora's carbon footprint?
Based on the carbon intensity of Azure US East / Sweden, each query produces approximately 225.0 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 Sora use?
Each query consumes approximately 1.85 L of water, primarily used for cooling the data centers that process the request.
How does Sora compare to a Google search?
A Sora query uses 1667x more than a Google search in terms of energy. A Google search uses approximately 0.3 Wh, while Sora uses 500.0 Wh.
Technical Details
Architecture
Diffusion Transformer (spatiotemporal)
Release date
2024-12-09
Open source
No