What our video engine has made so far

• The alternative we compare with: one take of AI-generated footage for each version of each video from an open AI video model (Wan2.2-TI2V-5B), run on the same computer as ours. We measured it in September 2026 at 1.4 kWh for each minute of footage, and scale it by each version's length.
• Conservative on purpose: we assume the AI video model gets every version right first time, with no retakes; we use its lowest measured rate and the top of our own range; and a Short cut down from one of our videos counts as no saving at all.
• Our own footprint is taken off first: an estimated 367 kWh at most. That counts drafting every version's script with an AI language model as a whole working session of its own, and rendering everything we rendered, including the takes we later replaced.
• CO2e, as a range: the electricity used in our office, for our rendering and for the AI video model we measured on the same computer, is counted at our electricity supplier's stated carbon intensity (EDF Energy, 173 g CO2/kWh, April 2025 to March 2026) for the higher figure, and at the UK grid average (143.95 g CO2e/kWh, DESNZ 2026) for the lower. The AI script drafting runs in the provider's data centres, so it is counted on our side at 384.4 g CO2e/kWh (the USA mix the EcoLogits tool assumes for them) in both.
• Not included, on either side: training the AI models, making the hardware, streaming the videos, and people's time.

Estimated, from published studio guides, not measured. Studio guides put a one-minute 2D animated explainer at 40 to 140 hours of skilled work. On an office workstation, at the UK government's figure of 150 watts, that is 6 to 21 kWh of electricity. One of our 70-second videos takes up to two hours of our staff's time and an estimated 0.2 to 1 kWh in all, counting the AI that helps draft the script as a whole working session. So even our highest estimate uses at least 6 times less electricity than the studio's lowest.

On price, a video is £39 before VAT, and UK animation studios' own price guides put a 60 to 90 second explainer in the thousands of pounds (how we compare).

The assumptions: 40 hours is the lowest published figure for a minute of 2D work, before revisions, and 140 hours the top of the basic tier; premium work takes longer. The workstation figure is the one the UK government uses for an office computer, screen and printer. Travel, heating, a voice-over studio and your own time are left out on both sides. Hand animation is a different product, with a storyboard you shape and a human voice.