Claude Opus: cost, energy and CO₂ per token
What is the footprint of Claude Opus? Claude Opus emits about 1.9 kg of CO₂e, uses 30.0 L of water and 5.1 kWh of electricity per million generated tokens. Per million input tokens: 88 g of CO₂e, 1.4 L of water, 238 Wh. Public price: €22 per million generated tokens, €4 for input.
Factors tokenclimate-v3-2026-08, updated on , high confidence. Sources and equations in the methodology.
Key figures, per million tokens
| Energy | CO₂e | Water | Price | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Input tokens | 238 Wh | 88 g | 1.4 L | €4 |
| Generated tokens | 5.1 kWh | 1.9 kg | 30.0 L | €22 |
Claude Opus emits 159% more than the median of the 20 models in the TokenClimate registry (723 g per million generated tokens), that is ×83 compared with Mistral Small, the most frugal.
One million generated tokens represents about 16 km in a petrol car and 1 shower.
Frequently asked questions
How much CO₂e for 1 million tokens with Claude Opus?
About 1.9 kg per million generated tokens and 88 g per million input tokens (factors tokenclimate-v3-2026-08 of the TokenClimate registry).
Where do these figures come from?
Factors published in TokenClimate's versioned registry, each with its citation on this page. The full equations and parameters are in the public methodology, at tokenclimate.com/en/methodology.
What is the confidence level?
High confidence: direct measurement of the model or calibrated decomposition.
How can you measure your organisation's real usage?
The AI usage report computes twelve months of cost and CO₂e from your organisation's Anthropic admin key (the key is never stored), ready in about fifteen minutes: tokenclimate.com/bilan/en. Locally, the open source plugin claude-carbon measures a Claude Code session.
Sources and method
Energy per token
The per-token energy factor behind the figures above, published with its citation. (Jegham et al., arXiv:2505.09598 (v6))
Infrastructure parameters
Datacenter parameters applied to this provider (the equations live in the methodology). (Jegham et al., arXiv:2505.09598 (v6))
| PUE | 1.14 |
| Grid carbon intensity (CIF) | 0.287 kgCO₂e/kWh |
| On-site water (WUE) | 0.12 L/kWh |
| Off-site water (EWIF) | 5.11 L/kWh |
| Amortised manufacturing (embodied) | 44 gCO₂e/kWh |
Price
Public provider prices.
Full equations and assumptions in the methodology.
Are you a developer? Measure your real Claude Opus usage
curl -fsSL "https://tokenclimate.com/install.sh?ref=models" | bashThe command installs the team CLI (you need your organisation's invitation code). Solo, the open source local version claude-carbon installs with npx claude-carbon, no account needed. Or estimate a volume first with the calculator.