AI created as much carbon pollution this year as New York City and guzzled up as much H20 as people consume globally in water bottles, according to new estimates.

The study paints what’s likely a pretty conservative picture of AI’s environmental impact since it’s based on the relatively limited amount of data that’s currently available to the public. A lack of transparency from tech companies makes it harder to see the potential environmental toll of AI becoming a part of everyday tasks, argues the author of the study who’s been tracking the electricity consumption of data centers used for AI and crypto mining over the years.

“There’s no way to put an extremely accurate number on this, but it’s going to be really big regardless… In the end, everyone is paying the price for this,” says Alex de Vries-Gao, a PhD candidate at the VU Amsterdam Institute for Environmental Studies who published his paper today in the journal Patterns.