I've heard many different groups tell me their small fraction is not the small fraction that matters.

It's not really about which one matters. They all matter. But here is a rough breakdown of global fossil fuel energy usage:

* Electricity: 27%

* Industry: 24%

* Transportation: 15%

* Agriculture & land use: 11%

* Buildings: 7%

Then within electricity, data centers use about 1.5% of global electricity. Within data centers, AI accounts for somewhere between 15-20% of energy use.

So if you take 27% × 1.5% × ~17%, you find that AI is currently responsible for something like 0.07% of global fossil fuel emissions.

It definitely matters in the "every bit matters" sense, but also the numbers paint a really different picture than you'd get from statement like the one we started with.