NEW: I got hold of the statement that countries are set to sign at the Paris Al Action Summit next week. Experts have slammed it as a "wasted opportunity", entirely devoid of substance and failing to follow through on commitments made at previous summits.

In 2004, it took the world a year to add a gigawatt of solar power — now it takes a day. To mitigate the negative impacts of climate change, the world needs to quickly transition from fossil fuels to low-carbon energy sources such as solar power. The chart shows how much this transition has accelerated in the last two decades. In 2004, it took the world about a year to add one gigawatt of solar power capacity. By 2023, the same amount was added, on average, every single day. For reference, a gigawatt of solar is enough to power approximately 200,000 homes in the US. Much of this growth has been driven by China, which by 2023 accounted for about 43% of the cumulative installed capacity worldwide. A big reason for this acceleration has been a large decrease in the price of solar panels. Since 2001, the price has dropped by about 95%, from $6.21 to $0.31 per watt (adjusted for inflation). (This Daily Data Insight was written by @charliegiattino.)

Since reading this post, I keep thinking of new comparisons to do. Here's one: If Alice eats a standard diet who never uses ChatGPT, and Bob is a vegetarian with an otherwise identical lifestyle who asks GPT-4 500 questions a day, Alice's emissions are higher.