Study Estimates LLMs Generate $123-$417 of Economic Value per Megajoule
dan_s_becker · x · 2026-10-24
An economic analysis estimates that LLMs produce $123-$417 of economic value per megajoule of energy — roughly $4.4k-$15k per dollar of electricity. Including hardware rental costs, the full estimated ROI is $15-$47.
The value estimates came from watching open-weight models complete specific tasks and multiplying human completion time for those tasks by occupational wages.
This per-energy-output framing offers a quantifiable reference for debates over whether AI compute spending is worth it.
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