A proposed standard
Greener
Hours.
Every AI API response carries a new number: how clean the power behind it was. Three tools show what that unlocks: a chat indicator, a job scheduler, and a procurement dashboard.
§ 01 · The problem
The user sees the AI.
They don't see any of this.
Projected global data-center electricity demand by 2030, more than double 2024's 415 TWh, with AI identified by the IEA as the lead driver.
IEA, Energy and AI (April 2025); Shehabi et al., 2024 U.S. Data Center Energy Usage Report, LBNL (Dec 2024). Dark-matter framing after Dan Hill, Dark Matter and Trojan Horses (Strelka, 2015); AI energy estimates: IEA, Energy and AI (2025).
§ 02 · The reframe
Visibility doesn't change end-user behavior. But visibility paired with a standard creates supply-side pressure.
The same pattern as HTTPS, energy labels, SBOM, and cloud-carbon dashboards.
End users didn't change.
Providers did.
A backend protocol made visible at the UI layer through a tiny glyph. No one wanted their site flagged “Not Secure” in Chrome. Within a decade the entire web shifted.
The same pattern, across domains
The A–G grade reshaped manufacturer behavior more than consumer behavior; appliances were re-engineered to climb the visible scale.
Barely moved consumers; drove reformulation (trans fats, sodium, sugar) because makers competed on what was visible.
AWS, Azure, GCP shipped per-service carbon in 2021–22 on procurement demand. The pattern works; the AI-specific extension is what's missing.
Google Transparency Report; Let's Encrypt annual reports (2017–24). Curve directional. Inflection: Chrome 68 (July 2018) flagged all non-HTTPS pages.
§ 03 · The product · the standard
One standard. Three surfaces.
Open-source spec · reference SDK in Python, TypeScript & Go · piggybacks on existing API plumbing. Adoption is three headers.
§ 04 · The three surfaces
One indicator, one scheduler, one dashboard.
Concept prototype · illustrative data · one shared simulation; grid & dashboard figures are invented · chat runs on a live model API via a server-side proxy
The P-codes on each surface map to the ten design principles from the Design for a Warming World course (SP26 syllabus); I built the project against that framework.
§ 05 · The opportunity · three forces
Why now, not five years ago.
Regulatory pressure
All demand vendor-level emissions data. None specify the technical standard.
Procurement demand
Cloud got per-service carbon dashboards. AI didn't.
Reusable infrastructure
Three layers already exist. The fourth is the work.
§ 06 · Named, not hidden · if it works
What this project cannot pretend.
The biggest lever for AI's footprint is supply-side: siting, PPAs, grid decarbonization. Greener Hours operates on a derivative lever: user-facing visibility pressuring the supply side. The bet is contestable; the HTTPS analog suggests the pattern works, but the timeline is uncertain.
Open standards get captured. Three guardrails: an open-source reference implementation, third-party verification of disclosure claims, and an anti-rebound layer that surfaces total consumption alongside efficiency. None is sufficient alone.
The sharpest critique I got at midterm, and the answer is structural, not defensive: Tier 1 is not a behavior tool. Behavior change happens at Tier 2 (a one-click default) and Tier 3 (institutional decisions). Tier 1's job is to make the cost visible, and visible costs create supply-side pressure.
Greener Hours is a timing-and-disclosure intervention, not a sufficiency one. It does not advocate using less AI. Tier 3 makes absolute usage visible, but visibility is not advocacy.
When compute disclosure becomes a normal procurement field.
- 3 of 5Adoption · 24 mo major AI providers implement the spec, on competitive and procurement pressure.
- 60%Coverage of enterprise AI API calls return standardized carbon data by default.
- 40%Behavior · Tier 2 of deferrable batch tasks shift to cleaner grid windows.
- 5+Institutional · Tier 3 Fortune 100 buyers name the spec in AI RFPs.
- 1Regulatory EU AI Act or California SB 253 references the spec: the mandate moment.
- ∞Cultural “What's your compute-carbon disclosure?” becomes a normal sales question.
Directional, not predictive: these are the moves I'd watch for, not measured outcomes.