{"row":{"n":"0018","slug":"nep-0018-energy-honesty","file":"nep-0018-energy-honesty.md","headline":"Energy honesty — the cost doctrine, transposed to watt-hours","title":"Extend cost honesty to energy: floors, ceilings, UNBOUNDED, and never a fabricated zero","status":"Draft","type":"Standards Track","created":"2026-07-29","author":"Thibaut Melen (SuperNovae Studio)","lede":"Give energy the exact doctrine cost already has: a static ENERGY reading\nbeside COST, speaking the same four words — floor · ceiling ·\nUNBOUNDED · unpriced — over the catalog's sourced watt-hour facts, with\nunknown stays unknown as the governing law (an energy Nika cannot prove\nis never rendered as 0 Wh, a local model is unpriced — your watts —\nnever « free »).","sections":[{"title":"Abstract","anchor":"abstract"},{"title":"Motivation","anchor":"motivation"},{"title":"Specification","anchor":"specification"},{"title":"Conformance test","anchor":"conformance-test"},{"title":"Compatibility impact","anchor":"compatibility-impact"},{"title":"Migration plan","anchor":"migration-plan"},{"title":"Rejected alternatives","anchor":"rejected-alternatives"}],"words":1414,"sha256":"06b456666c61922f8fb84284661e9567e54ecb33d42628666fddc953ae17edf3"},"prev":{"n":"0017","slug":"nep-0017-thin-laws-3b","file":"nep-0017-thin-laws-3b.md","headline":"The thin-laws (lot 3b): the pricing table in the pin · the end obligation · the third blame polarity · the named solo endorsement","title":"Four more small laws — the versioned pricing table rides the semantic pin, a failed run owes an attested quarantine, a normalization default is blamed on the contract that declares it, and a one-endorser action names its mode","status":"Draft","type":"Standards Track","created":"2026-07-29","author":"Thibaut Melen (SuperNovae Studio)","lede":"The second batch of laws too small for their own NEPs and too real to\nstay ambient — the continuation NEP-0014's Reference Implementation\nannounced.","sections":[{"title":"Abstract","anchor":"abstract"},{"title":"Motivation","anchor":"motivation"},{"title":"Specification","anchor":"specification"},{"title":"Rationale","anchor":"rationale"},{"title":"Backwards Compatibility","anchor":"backwards-compatibility"},{"title":"Reference Implementation","anchor":"reference-implementation"},{"title":"Copyright","anchor":"copyright"}],"words":996,"sha256":"1db2cf1f1f017ccbe6d2948a77de07441df515f4bbf451cf2d9a18faba3caae2"},"next":null,"total":18}

[{"k":"h","depth":1,"text":"NEP-0018 · Energy honesty — the cost doctrine, transposed to watt-hours","id":"nep-0018--energy-honesty--the-cost-doctrine-transposed-to-watt-hours"},{"k":"list","ordered":false,"items":[[{"k":"strong","text":"NEP"},{"k":"text","text":": 0018"}],[{"k":"strong","text":"Title"},{"k":"text","text":": Extend cost honesty to energy: floors, ceilings, UNBOUNDED, and never a fabricated zero"}],[{"k":"strong","text":"Author"},{"k":"text","text":": Thibaut Melen (SuperNovae Studio)"}],[{"k":"strong","text":"Status"},{"k":"text","text":": Draft"}],[{"k":"strong","text":"Type"},{"k":"text","text":": Standards Track"}],[{"k":"strong","text":"Created"},{"k":"text","text":": 2026-07-29"}]]},{"k":"h","depth":2,"text":"Abstract","id":"abstract"},{"k":"p","inline":[{"k":"text","text":"Give energy the exact doctrine cost already has: a static "},{"k":"code","text":"ENERGY"},{"k":"text","text":" reading\nbeside "},{"k":"code","text":"COST"},{"k":"text","text":", speaking the same four words — "},{"k":"strong","text":"floor · ceiling ·\nUNBOUNDED · unpriced"},{"k":"text","text":" — over the catalog's sourced watt-hour facts, with\n"},{"k":"em","text":"unknown stays unknown"},{"k":"text","text":" as the governing law (an energy Nika cannot prove\nis never rendered as "},{"k":"code","text":"0 Wh"},{"k":"text","text":", a local model is "},{"k":"em","text":"unpriced"},{"k":"text","text":" — your watts —\nnever « free »). The data rail already exists (catalog schema "},{"k":"code","text":"@1.3"},{"k":"text","text":" ·\n"},{"k":"code","text":"energy = { wh_per_mtok_out, provenance, scope, source, measured_at }"},{"k":"text","text":");\nthis NEP is the doctrine, the render contract, and the sourcing rule that\nmake the rail honest instead of decorative."}]},{"k":"h","depth":2,"text":"Motivation","id":"motivation"},{"k":"p","inline":[{"k":"text","text":"Cost honesty shipped the vocabulary and the scar tissue: the "},{"k":"code","text":"COST"},{"k":"text","text":" rung\nspeaks ceiling ("},{"k":"code","text":"≤"},{"k":"text","text":") or names each uncapped task, never a number whose\nunbounded part hides — the engine measured "},{"k":"strong","text":"328×"},{"k":"text","text":" between a printed\nestimate and the real bill on the commonest first workflow (fetch a large\ndocument · summarise it), and "},{"k":"strong","text":"126×"},{"k":"text","text":" the other way when a floor claimed\nwhat it could not bound. The lesson is general: "},{"k":"em","text":"a bounded-looking number\nthat hides its unbounded part is worse than no number."}]},{"k":"p","inline":[{"k":"text","text":"Energy is the same claim shape with worse data. Vendors publish almost\nnothing; the temptation is to render "},{"k":"code","text":"0 Wh"},{"k":"text","text":" for a local model or an\nunmeasured API — which is exactly the « free » lie cost honesty killed. A\nlocal model draws watts from the operator's wall; an unmeasured cloud call\ndraws watts from someone's datacenter. Both are facts without figures —\nand a fact without a figure renders as "},{"k":"strong","text":"unpriced"},{"k":"text","text":", never zero."}]},{"k":"p","inline":[{"k":"text","text":"Today (2026-07-29) the whole of nika-spec contains zero occurrences of\n« energy »: the reference engine's catalog learned the fields\n(schema "},{"k":"code","text":"@1.3"},{"k":"text","text":") and vendored its first sourced figure, and the spec says\nnothing. Rails without a train. This NEP is the train."}]},{"k":"h","depth":2,"text":"Specification","id":"specification"},{"k":"h","depth":3,"text":"1 · Vocabulary (normative · identical to cost)","id":"1--vocabulary-normative--identical-to-cost"},{"k":"p","inline":[{"k":"text","text":"Every energy surface speaks the four cost words, with the same semantics:"}]},{"k":"list","ordered":false,"items":[[{"k":"text","text":"Word · Meaning (energy)"}],[{"k":"text","text":"**floor** (`≥`) · the provable minimum Wh — real draw can only be higher"}],[{"k":"text","text":"**ceiling** (`≤`) · the provable worst case — per-task `max_tokens` cap × a sourced `wh_per_mtok_out`, summed over bounded tasks"}],[{"k":"text","text":"**UNBOUNDED** · a task whose energy has no provable limit, with the WHY (`no max_tokens declared` · fixable by the author)"}],[{"k":"text","text":"**unpriced** · tokens will be spent but no sourced energy figure exists for the model (`no energy figure (unmeasured model)` · absence over guess)"}]]},{"k":"p","inline":[{"k":"text","text":"The rendering law is the cost law verbatim: "},{"k":"strong","text":"name the bounded part,\nname every unbounded task, never print a total that hides either."},{"k":"text","text":" A\nsurface that cannot honor this prints nothing rather than a wrong number."}]},{"k":"h","depth":3,"text":"2 · The data model (the `@1.3` rail · already shipped engine-side)","id":"2--the-data-model-the-13-rail--already-shipped-engine-side"},{"k":"p","inline":[{"k":"text","text":"An energy fact is five fields, none optional within the fact:"}]},{"k":"code","lang":"toml","text":"energy = { wh_per_mtok_out = 42.0, provenance = \"independent-measured\",\n           scope = \"gpu\",\n           source = \"ml.energy leaderboard v3.0 · H100 · vLLM · conversation workload (arXiv 2505.06371)\",\n           measured_at = \"2025-12\" }"},{"k":"list","ordered":false,"items":[[{"k":"strong","text":"`wh_per_mtok_out`"},{"k":"text","text":" — watt-hours per million OUTPUT tokens, finite and\n"},{"k":"code","text":"> 0"},{"k":"text","text":" (a zero would claim free inference; the null is the absent fact).\nPer-OUTPUT because decode dominates measured inference energy (≥96% in\nthe ML.energy v3.0 methodology): a per-total figure would dilute the\nnumber with nearly-free prefill and reward long prompts."}],[{"k":"strong","text":"`provenance`"},{"k":"text","text":" (closed set) — WHO produced the number:\n"},{"k":"code","text":"measured-local"},{"k":"text","text":" · "},{"k":"code","text":"independent-measured"},{"k":"text","text":" · "},{"k":"code","text":"vendor-claim"},{"k":"text","text":" ·\n"},{"k":"code","text":"independent-estimate"},{"k":"text","text":". An estimate may enter — EXPLICITLY, wearing its\nlabel — never as a silent default."}],[{"k":"strong","text":"`scope`"},{"k":"text","text":" (closed set) — WHAT the number covers: "},{"k":"code","text":"gpu"},{"k":"text","text":" (accelerator\nonly) · "},{"k":"code","text":"device"},{"k":"text","text":" (whole host) · "},{"k":"code","text":"fleet"},{"k":"text","text":" (host + idle + PUE). A GPU-only\nfigure is roughly half a fleet figure for the same model: without this\naxis two truthful numbers are silently incomparable. A surface MUST NOT\nsum or compare figures across scopes without naming the mix."}],[{"k":"strong","text":"`source` + `measured_at`"},{"k":"text","text":" — the citable origin and the ISO month.\nEnergy figures rot with hardware and runtime generations; a dateless or\nsourceless figure is refused at build time (absence over guess)."}]]},{"k":"h","depth":3,"text":"3 · The `ENERGY` reading in the static forecast","id":"3--the-energy-reading-in-the-static-forecast"},{"k":"p","inline":[{"k":"code","text":"nika check"},{"k":"text","text":" renders an "},{"k":"code","text":"ENERGY"},{"k":"text","text":" rung beside "},{"k":"code","text":"COST"},{"k":"text","text":", same ladder, same\ngrammar:"}]},{"k":"code","lang":"text","text":" ✔ ENERGY   ≤ 2.7 Wh worst-case OUTPUT ceiling (gpu-scope · 1 of 3 tasks measured)\n      brief   groq/qwen/qwen3-32b   ≤64k tk · ≤ 2.7 Wh (independent-measured · 2025-12)\n      triage  anthropic/claude-…    unpriced — no energy figure (unmeasured model)\n      poll    ollama/qwen3.5:4b     unpriced — no energy figure (local model · your watts)\n ⚠  ENERGY   unbounded (uncapped tasks present)\n      think   …                     UNBOUNDED — no max_tokens declared"},{"k":"p","inline":[{"k":"text","text":"Rules: the rung appears whenever the workflow has ≥1 inference task (the\nsame suppression as "},{"k":"code","text":"COST"},{"k":"text","text":"'s « no inference tasks »); the headline carries\nthe scope axis whenever a ceiling is claimed; a mixed-scope sum names the\nmix or refuses to sum; prompts stay unpriced (the same narrowing "},{"k":"code","text":"COST"},{"k":"text","text":"\ncarries — the ceiling is an OUTPUT ceiling)."}]},{"k":"h","depth":3,"text":"4 · Aggregation","id":"4--aggregation"},{"k":"p","inline":[{"k":"code","text":"nika:inspect view: cost"},{"k":"text","text":" gains the energy aggregate under the same\nhonesty markers (bounded Wh where derivable · unpriced counts elsewhere),\nor a sibling "},{"k":"code","text":"view: energy"},{"k":"text","text":" — implementation's choice, the MARKERS are the\ncontract."}]},{"k":"h","depth":3,"text":"5 · The gate (optional · symmetric)","id":"5--the-gate-optional--symmetric"},{"k":"p","inline":[{"k":"code","text":"--max-energy-wh"},{"k":"text","text":" is a "},{"k":"strong","text":"block-before-spend"},{"k":"text","text":" gate symmetric to\n"},{"k":"code","text":"--max-cost-usd"},{"k":"text","text":": refuse at start when the provable part already exceeds\nthe budget; stop mid-run at the last pre-spend seam otherwise. The stop\nmints a documented error code in the budget family (spec "},{"k":"code","text":"05"},{"k":"text","text":" · the id is\nfixed at implementation time, adjacent to the cost stop — this NEP\nreserves the semantics, not the number). A run stopped by the gate is a\nrefusal with a named reason, never a crash."}]},{"k":"h","depth":3,"text":"6 · The sourcing rule","id":"6--the-sourcing-rule"},{"k":"p","inline":[{"k":"text","text":"A figure enters the catalog ONLY as the five-field fact above. No figure\n= absent = unpriced. Deriving figures from parameter counts or vendor\nmarketing is forbidden as a default; third-party modelling may enter as\n"},{"k":"code","text":"independent-estimate"},{"k":"text","text":", labelled. First sourced row (engine, 2026-07-29):\n"},{"k":"code","text":"groq / qwen/qwen3-32b"},{"k":"text","text":" from the ML.energy leaderboard v3.0 (H100 · vLLM ·\narXiv 2505.06371) — open-weight models are the measurable frontier, and\nthat asymmetry is itself honest: closed-API models stay unpriced until a\nvendor discloses or an independent methodology covers them."}]},{"k":"h","depth":2,"text":"Conformance test","id":"conformance-test"},{"k":"p","inline":[{"k":"text","text":"Fixtures (engine forecast tests first; spec "},{"k":"code","text":"conformance/"},{"k":"text","text":" rows when the\nrender contract freezes — this NEP is Draft):"}]},{"k":"list","ordered":true,"items":[[{"k":"text","text":"one capped task on a measured model → "},{"k":"code","text":"ENERGY"},{"k":"text","text":" prints "},{"k":"code","text":"≤ cap × wh_per_mtok_out"},{"k":"text","text":" with the scope axis named;"}],[{"k":"text","text":"the same workflow on an unmeasured model → "},{"k":"code","text":"unpriced"},{"k":"text","text":", and the string\n"},{"k":"code","text":"0 Wh"},{"k":"text","text":" appears nowhere;"}],[{"k":"text","text":"an uncapped task → "},{"k":"code","text":"UNBOUNDED — no max_tokens declared"},{"k":"text","text":", named per\ntask, no total claimed;"}],[{"k":"text","text":"mixed scopes in one workflow → the headline names the mix or refuses\nthe sum;"}],[{"k":"text","text":"(gate) a run whose provable floor exceeds "},{"k":"code","text":"--max-energy-wh"},{"k":"text","text":" refuses\nbefore any provider is touched, with the documented code."}]]},{"k":"h","depth":2,"text":"Compatibility impact","id":"compatibility-impact"},{"k":"p","inline":[{"k":"text","text":"Additive. No workflow-YAML surface changes (the gate is CLI, the rung is\nrender, the facts are catalog data). Surfaces checked: envelope (spec\n"},{"k":"code","text":"01"},{"k":"text","text":" · untouched) · check render (new rung) · "},{"k":"code","text":"nika:inspect"},{"k":"text","text":" (new\nfields, additive) · catalog schema "},{"k":"code","text":"@1.3"},{"k":"text","text":" (already shipped) · trace (the\ngate stop reuses the budget-refusal shape)."}]},{"k":"h","depth":2,"text":"Migration plan","id":"migration-plan"},{"k":"p","inline":[{"k":"text","text":"None (additive)."}]},{"k":"h","depth":2,"text":"Rejected alternatives","id":"rejected-alternatives"},{"k":"list","ordered":false,"items":[[{"k":"strong","text":"CO₂e as the primary unit"},{"k":"text","text":" — rejected: carbon intensity varies by\ngrid, hour and region; a gCO₂e constant hides a location assumption\ninside a number. Wh is the measurable; a carbon projection is a later\ninformational annex taking an explicit grid factor as INPUT."}],[{"k":"strong","text":"Estimating absent figures (parameter-count heuristics)"},{"k":"text","text":" — rejected\nas a default: a fabricated default wearing a lab coat. The\n"},{"k":"code","text":"independent-estimate"},{"k":"text","text":" provenance exists so modelling can enter\nexplicitly, labelled, never silently."}],[{"k":"strong","text":"`0 Wh` for local models"},{"k":"text","text":" — rejected: the exact « free » lie cost\nhonesty killed. Local inference is unpriced — the operator's watts."}],[{"k":"strong","text":"An `energy:` budget block in workflow YAML"},{"k":"text","text":" — rejected: enforcement\nis an engine/CLI concern (the spec "},{"k":"code","text":"08"},{"k":"text","text":" §Observability precedent for\ncost budgets) · the language surface stays clean."}],[{"k":"strong","text":"A single scopeless number"},{"k":"text","text":" — rejected: gpu-vs-fleet differ ~2× on\nthe same model; a scopeless figure makes two truths incomparable and\nevery comparison a lie."}]]}]

NEP-0018

Energy honesty — the cost doctrine, transposed to watt-hours

Draft · Standards Track · opened 2026-07-29 · 1414 words

NEP-0018 · Energy honesty — the cost doctrine, transposed to watt-hours #

NEP: 0018
Title: Extend cost honesty to energy: floors, ceilings, UNBOUNDED, and never a fabricated zero
Author: Thibaut Melen (SuperNovae Studio)
Status: Draft
Type: Standards Track
Created: 2026-07-29

Abstract #

Give energy the exact doctrine cost already has: a static ENERGY reading beside COST, speaking the same four words — floor · ceiling · UNBOUNDED · unpriced — over the catalog's sourced watt-hour facts, with unknown stays unknown as the governing law (an energy Nika cannot prove is never rendered as 0 Wh, a local model is unpriced — your watts — never « free »). The data rail already exists (catalog schema @1.3 · energy = { wh_per_mtok_out, provenance, scope, source, measured_at }); this NEP is the doctrine, the render contract, and the sourcing rule that make the rail honest instead of decorative.

Motivation #

Cost honesty shipped the vocabulary and the scar tissue: the COST rung speaks ceiling (≤) or names each uncapped task, never a number whose unbounded part hides — the engine measured 328× between a printed estimate and the real bill on the commonest first workflow (fetch a large document · summarise it), and 126× the other way when a floor claimed what it could not bound. The lesson is general: a bounded-looking number that hides its unbounded part is worse than no number.

Energy is the same claim shape with worse data. Vendors publish almost nothing; the temptation is to render 0 Wh for a local model or an unmeasured API — which is exactly the « free » lie cost honesty killed. A local model draws watts from the operator's wall; an unmeasured cloud call draws watts from someone's datacenter. Both are facts without figures — and a fact without a figure renders as unpriced, never zero.

Today (2026-07-29) the whole of nika-spec contains zero occurrences of « energy »: the reference engine's catalog learned the fields (schema @1.3) and vendored its first sourced figure, and the spec says nothing. Rails without a train. This NEP is the train.

Specification #

1 · Vocabulary (normative · identical to cost) #

Every energy surface speaks the four cost words, with the same semantics:

Word · Meaning (energy)
**floor** (`≥`) · the provable minimum Wh — real draw can only be higher
**ceiling** (`≤`) · the provable worst case — per-task `max_tokens` cap × a sourced `wh_per_mtok_out`, summed over bounded tasks
**UNBOUNDED** · a task whose energy has no provable limit, with the WHY (`no max_tokens declared` · fixable by the author)
**unpriced** · tokens will be spent but no sourced energy figure exists for the model (`no energy figure (unmeasured model)` · absence over guess)

The rendering law is the cost law verbatim: name the bounded part, name every unbounded task, never print a total that hides either. A surface that cannot honor this prints nothing rather than a wrong number.

2 · The data model (the `@1.3` rail · already shipped engine-side) #

An energy fact is five fields, none optional within the fact:

toml

1energy = { wh_per_mtok_out = 42.0, provenance = "independent-measured",2           scope = "gpu",3           source = "ml.energy leaderboard v3.0 · H100 · vLLM · conversation workload (arXiv 2505.06371)",4           measured_at = "2025-12" }

`wh_per_mtok_out` — watt-hours per million OUTPUT tokens, finite and > 0 (a zero would claim free inference; the null is the absent fact). Per-OUTPUT because decode dominates measured inference energy (≥96% in the ML.energy v3.0 methodology): a per-total figure would dilute the number with nearly-free prefill and reward long prompts.
`provenance` (closed set) — WHO produced the number: measured-local · independent-measured · vendor-claim · independent-estimate. An estimate may enter — EXPLICITLY, wearing its label — never as a silent default.
`scope` (closed set) — WHAT the number covers: gpu (accelerator only) · device (whole host) · fleet (host + idle + PUE). A GPU-only figure is roughly half a fleet figure for the same model: without this axis two truthful numbers are silently incomparable. A surface MUST NOT sum or compare figures across scopes without naming the mix.
`source` + `measured_at` — the citable origin and the ISO month. Energy figures rot with hardware and runtime generations; a dateless or sourceless figure is refused at build time (absence over guess).

3 · The `ENERGY` reading in the static forecast #

nika check renders an ENERGY rung beside COST, same ladder, same grammar:

text

1 ✔ ENERGY   ≤ 2.7 Wh worst-case OUTPUT ceiling (gpu-scope · 1 of 3 tasks measured)2      brief   groq/qwen/qwen3-32b   ≤64k tk · ≤ 2.7 Wh (independent-measured · 2025-12)3      triage  anthropic/claude-…    unpriced — no energy figure (unmeasured model)4      poll    ollama/qwen3.5:4b     unpriced — no energy figure (local model · your watts)5 ⚠  ENERGY   unbounded (uncapped tasks present)6      think   …                     UNBOUNDED — no max_tokens declared

Rules: the rung appears whenever the workflow has ≥1 inference task (the same suppression as COST's « no inference tasks »); the headline carries the scope axis whenever a ceiling is claimed; a mixed-scope sum names the mix or refuses to sum; prompts stay unpriced (the same narrowing COST carries — the ceiling is an OUTPUT ceiling).

4 · Aggregation #

nika:inspect view: cost gains the energy aggregate under the same honesty markers (bounded Wh where derivable · unpriced counts elsewhere), or a sibling view: energy — implementation's choice, the MARKERS are the contract.

5 · The gate (optional · symmetric) #

--max-energy-wh is a block-before-spend gate symmetric to --max-cost-usd: refuse at start when the provable part already exceeds the budget; stop mid-run at the last pre-spend seam otherwise. The stop mints a documented error code in the budget family (spec 05 · the id is fixed at implementation time, adjacent to the cost stop — this NEP reserves the semantics, not the number). A run stopped by the gate is a refusal with a named reason, never a crash.

6 · The sourcing rule #

A figure enters the catalog ONLY as the five-field fact above. No figure = absent = unpriced. Deriving figures from parameter counts or vendor marketing is forbidden as a default; third-party modelling may enter as independent-estimate, labelled. First sourced row (engine, 2026-07-29): groq / qwen/qwen3-32b from the ML.energy leaderboard v3.0 (H100 · vLLM · arXiv 2505.06371) — open-weight models are the measurable frontier, and that asymmetry is itself honest: closed-API models stay unpriced until a vendor discloses or an independent methodology covers them.

Conformance test #

Fixtures (engine forecast tests first; spec conformance/ rows when the render contract freezes — this NEP is Draft):

one capped task on a measured model → ENERGY prints ≤ cap × wh_per_mtok_out with the scope axis named;
the same workflow on an unmeasured model → unpriced, and the string 0 Wh appears nowhere;
an uncapped task → UNBOUNDED — no max_tokens declared, named per task, no total claimed;
mixed scopes in one workflow → the headline names the mix or refuses the sum;
(gate) a run whose provable floor exceeds --max-energy-wh refuses before any provider is touched, with the documented code.

Compatibility impact #

Additive. No workflow-YAML surface changes (the gate is CLI, the rung is render, the facts are catalog data). Surfaces checked: envelope (spec 01 · untouched) · check render (new rung) · nika:inspect (new fields, additive) · catalog schema @1.3 (already shipped) · trace (the gate stop reuses the budget-refusal shape).

Migration plan #

None (additive).

Rejected alternatives #

CO₂e as the primary unit — rejected: carbon intensity varies by grid, hour and region; a gCO₂e constant hides a location assumption inside a number. Wh is the measurable; a carbon projection is a later informational annex taking an explicit grid factor as INPUT.
Estimating absent figures (parameter-count heuristics) — rejected as a default: a fabricated default wearing a lab coat. The independent-estimate provenance exists so modelling can enter explicitly, labelled, never silently.
`0 Wh` for local models — rejected: the exact « free » lie cost honesty killed. Local inference is unpriced — the operator's watts.
An `energy:` budget block in workflow YAML — rejected: enforcement is an engine/CLI concern (the spec 08 §Observability precedent for cost budgets) · the language surface stays clean.
A single scopeless number — rejected: gpu-vs-fleet differ ~2× on the same model; a scopeless figure makes two truths incomparable and every comparison a lie.

This proposal in the spec repo The specification it amends