Is quantum computing green? An estimate for an energy-efficiency quantum advantage

Abstract

The quantum advantage threshold determines when a quantum processing unit (QPU) is more efficient with respect to classical computing hardware in terms of algorithmic complexity. The ‘green’ quantum advantage threshold—based on a comparison of energetic efficiency between the two—is going to play a fundamental role in the comparison between quantum and classical hardware. Indeed, its characterization would enable better decisions on energy-saving strategies, e.g. for distributing the workload in hybrid quantum–classical algorithms. Here, we show that the green quantum advantage threshold crucially depends on (a) the quality of the experimental quantum gates and (b) the entanglement generated in the QPU. Indeed, for noisy intermediate-scale quantum hardware and algorithms requiring a moderate amount of entanglement, a classical tensor network emulation can be more energy-efficient at equal final state fidelity than quantum computation. We compute the green quantum advantage threshold for a few paradigmatic examples in terms of algorithms and hardware platforms, and identify algorithms with a power-law decay of singular values of bipartitions—with power-law exponent —as the green quantum advantage threshold in the near future.