The first issue of IEEE Energy Sustainability Magazine published in the first half of 2026 featured a Special Issue entitled “Energy Sustainability With Computility–Electricity–Carbon Coordination,” led by Professor Kang Chongqing of the Department of Electrical Engineering, who was invited to serve as lead guest editor, together with Dai Jing, Deputy Director of the Energy Governance Research Center at Tsinghua University Institute of Energy Internet Innovation, and Du Ershun, Associate Research Fellow at the Low-Carbon Energy Laboratory.

Cover of the Special Issue of IEEE Energy Sustainability Magazine

In recent years, the rapid growth of large-scale artificial intelligence models has made computing centers—key infrastructure supporting AI computing services—a growing source of tension between expanding computing capacity, rising energy consumption, and high carbon emissions, emerging as a major global challenge to sustainable development. It is estimated that global electricity consumption by computing centers reached 415 TWh in 2024, accounting for approximately 1.5% of total global electricity consumption. The International Energy Agency projects that by 2035, carbon emissions from computing centers in China and the United States will account for 3%–4.5% of their respective national total emissions. For the first time, the 2026 Report on the Work of the Government incorporated “computing-power–electricity coordination” into the country's new infrastructure initiatives, marking the integration of computing and electricity as an important strategic direction for technological development in China. Against this backdrop, the Special Issue invited scholars and engineers from leading universities, research institutions, and industry organizations in China, the United States, the United Kingdom, Denmark, Singapore, Australia, and other countries and regions to contribute. The issue ultimately brought together 10 high-quality papers. The papers provide in-depth research and application-oriented analysis in three major areas: technologies enabling interaction between sustainable AI and power systems, flexible operation of computing centers, and frameworks for decarbonizing computing centers.

Kang Chongqing, Dai Jing, and Du Ershun authored the guest editors' message, noting that coordination among computing power, electricity, and carbon represents both an emerging challenge and a transformative opportunity for energy sustainability. By deeply integrating efficient scheduling of computing workloads, flexible electricity supply from renewable energy and smart grids, and life-cycle carbon-aware decision-making, the coordination of computing power, electricity, and carbon can help address major challenges in energy sustainability, including the low-carbon transformation of the AI computing industry, renewable energy integration and secure operation of new power systems, and coordinated planning of computing and energy infrastructure.

Guest Editors' Message for the Special Issue of IEEE Energy Sustainability Magazine

Professor Mohammad Shahidehpour, Editor-in-Chief of IEEE Energy Sustainability Magazine and a member of the U.S. National Academy of Engineering, noted in the Editor's Voice that the rapid expansion of AI and other digital industries has made the energy consumption and carbon emissions of data centers a major global challenge for energy sustainability, while coordination among computing power, electricity, and carbon offers an effective pathway toward addressing this challenge.

Editor's Voice in IEEE Energy Sustainability Magazine

The launch of IEEE Energy Sustainability Magazine is a major initiative by the IEEE Power & Energy Society (PES) to advance the field of energy sustainability amid the global drive toward carbon neutrality. The magazine is dedicated to disseminating cutting-edge ideas and practical experience related to environmental sustainability and climate change in power system operation and planning. Published quarterly, the magazine features invited contributions in various formats, including Special Issues and Articles, with the number of papers varying from issue to issue. It is designed to help professionals in relevant fields, as well as those from interdisciplinary backgrounds, quickly gain an understanding of the latest technological developments in a particular area.

Link:

https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/tocresult.jsp?isnumber=11367116&punumber=10599323