Joules-to-GDP: How Much Economic Value Do AI Systems Produce per Unit of Energy?

The paper introduces Joules-to-GDP, a framework measuring Net Value per Joule (NVJ) and Time Saving per Joule (TSJ), and applies it to 220 GDPval tasks across 44 occupations. Among five tested models, GLM 5.2 delivers the most net value at $72.27 per task on average, while Gemma 4 31B reaches 56% of that with 23% of the energy, for 2.5x the NVJ and 2.8x the TSJ; eight H100s use 3.2x the energy of one to cut completion time by only 22%. Measured against the work of experts who use AI, GLM 5.2's NVJ falls by 70% and its TSJ by 65%.