Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Show HN: See the carbon impact of your cloud as you code

dashboard.infracost.io

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 34 posts

Re: Show HN: See the carbon impact of your cloud as you code

#11

Post by hkh »

Lerc wrote: post #4

>*Greenpixie said they have the data (AHA!!) And their data is verified (ISO-14064 & aligned with the Greenhouse Gas Protocol)." What does this say about accuracy, and I guess ultimately the impact of the emissions? Whenever I have tried to find a meaningful measurement of environmental impact of power use I have gotten into a quagmire of statistics taking past each other, with arbitrary mixing of units and definitio…

Lerc - they are in the UK, so some of them are offline, but I text their CEO :)

Check this out: https://greenpixie.com/gpx-data Thoughts?

Re: Show HN: See the carbon impact of your cloud as you code

#12

Post by JamesGreenpixie »

Lerc wrote: post #4

>*Greenpixie said they have the data (AHA!!) And their data is verified (ISO-14064 & aligned with the Greenhouse Gas Protocol)." What does this say about accuracy, and I guess ultimately the impact of the emissions? Whenever I have tried to find a meaningful measurement of environmental impact of power use I have gotten into a quagmire of statistics taking past each other, with arbitrary mixing of units and definitio…

There are thousands of ways to calculate carbon that are all valid, that’s why a similar usage amount in AWS and Azure will give you wildly different numbers. We prioritise consistency, coverage, and transparency. If the users understand where the numbers come from, and we are applying the similar data science across all clouds, then you have comparable numbers. We get our numbers audited by 3rd parties regularly to ensure robustness and credibility, but an accurate number for your entire AWS environment isn’t useful if you are just trying to calculate the difference between an AMD instance family, and a Graviton instance family. This is where we focus our methodology and why it works inside of Infracost.

A big focus now is applying this same level of rigorousness to different AI models and their impact. Batching, caching, model size and manufacturer are the choices engineers are making now. We want to ensure that choices being made are cost and carbon efficient.

Curious to know what decision you're making at the moment that's triggered you looking into your own methodology?

Re: Show HN: See the carbon impact of your cloud as you code

#13

Post by eichin »

hkh wrote: post #10
Lerc wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This reminds of me calorie tracking: you cannot perfectly capture the number of calories or macronutrients, but measuring does seem to help people loose weight. This probably would explain the success of many fad diets if it were the increased awareness of the eating having an effect beyond the decision making about what to eat.

Totally - something I've been thinking a lot about... I got pulled into these diets at one point in my life - I remember doing atkins, then went full vegan for a while, then went only meat lol The diets were meh. But the cool thing was that I learnt so much about food in general! I honestly didn't know much about food growing up. I feel like I still don't know that much, but I know the basics, and i'm not afraid of d…

Definitely. It's even worse in educational fads - kids thrive when paid special attention to, often despite the methodology-under-test...

Re: Show HN: See the carbon impact of your cloud as you code

#15

Post by Lerc »

JamesGreenpixie wrote: post #12
Lerc wrote: post #4

>*Greenpixie said they have the data (AHA!!) And their data is verified (ISO-14064 & aligned with the Greenhouse Gas Protocol)." What does this say about accuracy, and I guess ultimately the impact of the emissions? Whenever I have tried to find a meaningful measurement of environmental impact of power use I have gotten into a quagmire of statistics taking past each other, with arbitrary mixing of units and definitio…

There are thousands of ways to calculate carbon that are all valid, that’s why a similar usage amount in AWS and Azure will give you wildly different numbers. We prioritise consistency, coverage, and transparency. If the users understand where the numbers come from, and we are applying the similar data science across all clouds, then you have comparable numbers. We get our numbers audited by 3rd parties regularly to…

While there are thousands of valid ways to do the calculation. Their results, if they are different, denote different consequences.

I take it from what you say here that you specialise in accuracy and consistency of measurement as a service and let the client judge for themselves what meaning to derive from them. It feels like it might be an invitation to Goodhart's law.

I'm in no decision making position myself (that said, had a few face to face conversations with people writing position papers). My interest is primarily in understanding what has the best outcomes and the ability of strategies to affect those outcomes.

To put an absurd case. Imagine adding a gadget to generators to use all of the CO2 as part of a cyanide manufacturing process which is then emitted. It gives you great CO2 emission numbers, but public health outcomes less so.

Re: Show HN: See the carbon impact of your cloud as you code

#17

Post by hkh »

rtcode_io wrote: post #14

This is of zero use. Sell that to followers of WEF/EU/etc. to busy themselves and feel good.

haha ahh I think it goes in waves in the US, but you got me - I grew up in Scotland, and recently moved to the US full time. So the EU mindset is still here :)

Re: Show HN: See the carbon impact of your cloud as you code

#20

Post by hkh »

dinkblam wrote: post #18

does it include the breaths you take during coding? best if you can specify your lung volume and breaths per minute!

hahaha we could also track if you typed too fast! ... actually, this is an actual idea, if you use AI to generate the code ... hmmm; that would then be a fun project vs a cloud cost saving one
Post reply on HN