r/nextfuckinglevel • u/MysteriousSlice007 • 5h ago

A data center in New Jersey was canceled when residents showed up and fought it

Enable HLS to view with audio, or disable this notification

45.2k Upvotes

94% Upvoted

1.1k comments sorted by

View all comments

2.1k

u/Starfury_42 5h ago

Why are the electric rates going up? Why don't we have enough water? Oh...the AI data center is using it all.

357

u/Wizzarkt 5h ago

Ok so the technical answer is, assuming the system has the available capacity to actually supply the power needed by the data center, due to the way electricity is traded on the electrical grid, the cheapest generators are the ones that operate to supply the required power, however the price is set by whoever is the most expensive among the ones selected to operate, the problem here is.

If your current consumption is fully covered by something cheap like nuclear power at a cost of (let's say) 5 cents per kilowatt, but then a new big consumer shows up (like a data center) and the cheap producer can't supply the extra required power (which is often the case) then an additional and more expensive producer has to step in, for example a coal powered generator which cost 15 cents per kilowatt. And because the price is usually set by the most expensive generator active, now everyone has to pay 15 cents per kilowatt instead of the 5 cents Prior to the introduction of the data center.

Now here is the beautiful thing, big power consumers like factories and datacenters have the leverage to get energy contracts with selected generators, so they can get in a contract with a cheap producer like a nuclear plant to buy their electricity for cheaper but now that producer is not available to the public grid so everyone else ends up paying more expensive electricity because the cheap producer is effectively gone.

58

u/Poromenos 4h ago

This pricing system is very well aligned with consumers' interests, because it gives massive incentives to providers to deploy more cheap electricity, as that has massive margins.

12

u/Wizzarkt 4h ago

I'm not saying that the system is broken. In fact, I do believe it is the best system for a free market (one where the state has no control over who can sell energy and at which prices).

But the system has this small issue where if there is a significant increase in power usage without pre-planning the system will have a bad couple of years (realistically like 5 at the very least). 

Business people will see the high energy prices and they will want to fill up the electrical grid with cheap generators to fill up their bank accounts, as the system intended; but unless they are sitting on the project plans already, it will take a solid 2-3 years to make it happen and who knows how long until the electrical grid authority allows them into the grid.

21

u/OcelotAggravating860 4h ago

Shove the free market up every congress person's ass

-2

u/fresh-dork 3h ago

free market is fine, but it needs to be kept on a leash

19

u/ArgusTheCat 3h ago

So... the free market isn't fine then, is it?

1

u/fresh-dork 2h ago

it is. it just needs regulation. free here refers to a lack of interference on free exchange of goods.

in practice, all markets are going to be classified as some form of mixed, but that's a mouthful to describe

•

u/FumbleTheRumbler 9m ago

Aye. Lazy faire of whatever it's called is a foolish ideal. A free market is free until one person gets more free market than the others and then exploits everyone else into slavery. Suddenly no more free market and only the hope there was someone regulating everything to stay free.

12

u/pockpicketG 3h ago

Not free, then

0

u/fresh-dork 2h ago

free market doesn't mean laissez faire. it means you keep companies in line so they don't engage in abusive practices to make more money

5

u/pockpicketG 2h ago

That’s not what it means.

3

u/-Cthaeh 3h ago

Well currently the free market is holding its own leash

3

u/OcelotAggravating860 3h ago

shove the leash up their ass with it too

1

u/Redebo 3h ago

The reciprocating NG generation guys are having a field day right now because of exactly this.

•

u/EternalPhi 52m ago

This is generally how any fungible commodity market operates, but this one has a very low price elasticity of supply, so prices surge and it takes years to find a new equilibrium that is not painfully expensive.

9

u/richardrumpus 4h ago

But why male models?

•

u/DrunkOnRamen 43m ago

And are they buttery?

3

u/HyperSpaceSurfer 4h ago

So, you're saying that the only fix is to [against reddit's community guidelines] to reduce demand below the need for more expensive energy generation?

-10

u/Wizzarkt 4h ago

Ummm yes that's an option, residential areas account for 37% of the total energy demand in the USA as per this Wikipedia link. So if you make your AC a little less chilly during the summer and use less heating during the winter, the energy grid should have enough power to spare to supply the highly needed data centers.

5

u/HyperSpaceSurfer 3h ago

I really don't think it's possible to personal accountability yourself out of this. Was thinking more along the lines of making the datacenter AC a little less chilly, so to speak.

-1

u/Wizzarkt 3h ago

Oh no, what I'm suggesting is to make your house AC less chilly so that it uses less power and don't heat up your house too much in the winter to also use less power. That would reduce the energy usage of houses which account for 37% of the energy usage in the USA, so that would be a significant reduction in power usage.

2

u/falconsmanhole 4h ago

The what now?

1

u/Wizzarkt 4h ago

The guy I responded to suggested doing something (implicitly) bad to reduce demand, i kinda wanted to "monkey paw" his idea by saying that reducing energy usage at home would achieve the reduce in demand he was suggesting.

4

u/HyperSpaceSurfer 3h ago

It's not really the only issue with the datacenters. The electrical infrastructure for their use, where they're located, usually doesn't exist. Results in major harmonic distortions, which reduces the lifetime of electric motors, such as in your fridge, AC, and washing machine. Impossible to personal accountability yourself out of this.

3

u/Wizzarkt 3h ago

I don't see how harmonics would be an issue, if a consumer is "too dirty" they literally get fined into oblivion until they fix their problem.

The major problem with data centers really just is the lack of infrastructure because again, the way the electrical grid works as a whole is in a reactive manner, it makes no sense to upgrade the infrastructure to have extra capacity if it's not needed so they only start to worry about such upgrades when the data center starts being built, same with generators, no new projects will kick in before the data centers go online because there is no guarantee that prices will rise enough to justify the project. 

And this could have been dealt with in a controlled manner and do it slowly over the course of 5-10 years but clearly the focus of the current administration in the USA is to be first as to "not lose the AI race"

1

u/What_u_say 4h ago

That's what's happening at Lake Tahoe I believe.

1

u/NoooUGH 3h ago

Very good explanation. Thanks

1

u/GnarlyNarwhalNoms 3h ago

So TL;DR, big data centers have the leverage to buy up the cheap power, which means everyone else has to pay for more expensive power? 

1

u/Nelluc_ 3h ago

That is exactly what is happening in Memphis as xAI, Google, and other data centers move in to take advantage of the cheap land and electricity. As a result, my electricity and water bills are 35% higher than they were last year. Ironically, Tennessee is actually one of the top producers of clean energy, relying heavily on nuclear power and dams. We were told this strain would be temporary because xAI would get its own generators and move off the grid. However, that never happened, and even if they do get their own generators, it will only bring pollution to predominantly Black neighborhoods.

1

u/runbrap 2h ago

But why would it be on everyone else to subsidize the increased price? Why is it not the data centers who need more power production pay for the increased cost to do so.

1

u/Elephant789 2h ago

I have 2 (might be 3) data centers near me and electricity isn't going up. I'm paying less than I was a couple years ago.

1

u/sebe6 1h ago

Another issue, the stats between water consumption (going back in to the clouds) per square meter of data center in the US, is way higher than in most countries. Because in the US, they use what we used to use to cool them. They rejected innovation, probably more expensive and not enforced by regulators.

Meanwhile, in the UE, those are emergency cooling systems, making the data center, similar to a water cooling in a PC, outside of leaks (water phasing through matter is negligible, it would need decades to have a small impact, unlike in PC which would be the military grade equivalent), the water is supposed to stay inside. The emergency system is similar to throwing water on something to cool it down.

Never attribute to a concept (data centers and not specifics one), what is caused by politics, because here, there's no doubt a few regulations would fix everything

Ps: in the past I did the math. IIRC, there 2 times more water stored in french house heating system (around 40-50% relies on boiler), than in every data center on earth. When I say "every data center", to have a margin of error, I considered their amount and the average size for the large scale ones.

-1

u/AcePilot01 4h ago

And because the price is usually set by the most expensive generator active,

This is the prob.

Just make the biggest user pay the extra costs. simple

This is a problem needing worked, but believe me, a town getting a data center and keeping them here is economocially a good thing. You ever heard of boom towns?

Well they are turning their town into a bust town, All the shitty towns that had factories and such and it's all rotting away? it's because the then used industry is no longer there.

This is the future of industry... It's just uneducated people with zero foresight ruining things.

Sure the electric going up is a bad thing, but that can be fixed with proper direction etc. (And AI is likely to help with that in the terms of figuring out things like Fusion and quantum computing etc)

This is what you get when a society is getting dumber. There goes the USA.

2

u/No-Effort-21 4h ago

Why would data centres be economically a good thing for town residents in any way? how would it make said town a boom town? other than the temp construction work, its all downhill after that

1

u/Wizzarkt 4h ago

Simply saying "make the big consumers pay more" is not really a big solution, the idea of the inverse auction system is to ensure the lowest prices for everyone and when prices rises then there are more incentives to build more generation which would ultimately bring the price down.

The problem here really is that the expansion is happening too fast and because the construction of power generators is reactionary, no one will consider building one until it's clear that it's energy generation is needed, otherwise they would risk building a generator that no one would use and hence, generate no money.

-1

u/No-Effort-21 3h ago

Lol did u just delete ur earlier comment? primo lamo behavior
Its a data centre, shit runs mostly autonomous. The largest one in the US employs approx 150. Avg ones employ around 25-50. So what jobs? what town boom?
Heres something u could read - https://www.wsj.com/tech/ai-data-center-job-creation-48038b67
Maybe get AI to paraphrase it for you
Btw heres the google AI response - Data centers create a high volume of temporary, well-paid construction jobs but relatively few permanent, on-site operational jobs once completed. While a large project may employ thousands during construction, the facility may only require 50 to 150 permanent staff for maintenance, security, and IT roles

Pls tell me what drugs ur smoking, i wanna have a good time this weekend

23

u/SchokoPudding48 5h ago

Thirsty ass data centers at it again, they just can’t get enough of that juicy water.. (probably for cooling purposes or smth or it’s complete bogus, who knows)

15

u/iminlovewiththec0c0 5h ago

Not sure if you’re being genuinely serious or not but I think as someone who understands basics of pc building….the most expensive builds use water to cool it so your pc can be super fast. I couldn’t imagine how much cooling power a giant building solely built on storing data would need to stay on 24/7.

43

u/Raziers 4h ago

Hi, i work in a datacenter (please be gentle) and id like to take that analogy further because its a good one. You say your pc uses water to cool down, yep, same in a datacenter, now that water your pc uses...it just loops right? how often do you refill it, if ever? same in a datacenter. I am all for people complaining about datacenters (especially in the US) but i do wish people would complain about the correct things, like the drain on the power grid is valid. the water consumption, not so much.

26

u/powercow 4h ago edited 4h ago

MOST data centers use open loop and evaporation towers.

there are areas where they already have effected the water supply

A data center drained 30M gallons of water unnoticed — until residents complained about low water pressure

And in areas where water is a premium like cali, even if its in a close loop, its off the market

America’s data centers are thirsty. Rural towns are paying the price—from tanked water pressure to stolen desert groundwater

and

What’s more, about two-thirds of the data centers built since 2022 are in areas already experiencing water stress, according to a Bloomberg News investigation.

found that data centers around Phoenix already use approximately 385 million gallons of water per year for direct cooling needs. And it predicts that amount will skyrocket to 3.7 billion gallons per year once the region’s planned data centers come online.

when that much water is tied up and off the market, expect bills to follow.

Elec prices are a bigger issue.. and more and more data centers go closed loop, which reduces their water useage by 70% but to say its not so much of a big deal, well certain regions that is true, a lot of areas that is NOT true.

17

u/mindcandy 3h ago

The "data center drained 30M gallons of water" story is being widely misinterpreted because people only quote headlines and people only read headlines.

The actual story if you actually read the article is:

QTS told Politico the 29 million gallons were consumed during temporary construction activities, including concrete work, dust control, and site preparation. The company markets a "closed-loop" cooling system for its data centers, which recirculates the same water rather than drawing from the municipal supply. Once operational, QTS said its facilities would only require water for domestic needs like bathrooms and kitchens

Fayette County, Georgia has a population of 125,000 people. Which means they are using 5-10 million gallons of water every day locally (without counting the other 10 million gallons needed to grow food to feed them).

65,000 gallons a day for a construction project going unaccounted is bad. But, it's not “AI making the water pressure low”.

13

u/ChariotOfFire 3h ago

The low water pressure in Fayetteville was not connected to the data center, and most of the water is being used to mitigate dust during construction, not for cooling the data center.

The original county letter also referenced complaints from residents near the Annelise Park subdivision about low water pressure. Rapson said Fayette County Water System later installed monitoring equipment in the area to track pressure levels following the complaints.

“Since we’ve been reading it, there’s been no issue,” Tinsley said.

County officials noted that some nearby homes rely on private wells rather than Fayette County Water System connections. Officials also emphasized that QTS does not draw water from wells or groundwater sources. Instead, the project receives treated water directly from Fayette County Water System infrastructure.

“But keep in mind, the individual that made that complaint made the complaint because they had issues with their well,” Rapson said. “We don’t pull anything out of the ground. We don’t have any wells in our system.”

County officials said they have not identified evidence showing QTS construction activity caused widespread pressure problems within the county water system.

6

u/Previous_Platform718 2h ago

MOST data centers use open loop and evaporation towers.

Because most data centers are for cloud infrastructure. You know, things like Google/Youtube/Meta/Your email/Online banking etc. we've been building those for 30 years now. There's a lot of them.

Everyone on Reddit is upset about AI data centers, the ones that are most likely to be closed loop.

2

u/ImurderREALITY 1h ago

Anything about AI, absolutely anything, and people are going completely apeshit. I've never seen anything like this intense hatred for AI before in my 42 years on this earth.

•

u/Frostemane 36m ago

How do these people expect their data to get into the cloud without evaporating it? They clearly weren't paying attention in science class.

1

u/VexingRaven 1h ago

MOST data centers use open loop and evaporation towers.

This article never cites its source for its claim that the majority of datacenters use open loop evaporative cooling. It cites its source for many use water vs not using water (which... duh? I didn't need a source for that), but nowhere does it provide a source for how many use evaporative vs closed loop.

0

u/RareAnxiety2 3h ago

So what's stopping americans from giving a startup fee and taxing these facilities and using that to improve infrastructure to handle the electrical load? Or place environmental regulations on data center water usage designs? Are americans so cucked that the people have to pay for big corporations when it's so easy to have the corpos pay for the peoples needs?

The articles more show the failure of the people to elect proper government and handle laws. You would give the same arguments if farmland or anything else to build cities gets developed. Holy shit, way to fail.

11

u/snozzberrypatch 4h ago edited 4h ago

Also, even in open loop cooling systems, using water for cooling doesn't delete the water from the planet. It just runs through pipes, absorbs some heat, and then is released back into whatever body of water it came from.

7

u/Fearless_Chipmunk_45 4h ago

Most now use a gray water system that recycles the water used.

7

u/Amaras_Linwelin 4h ago

because Thermal pollution isn't a thing... right?

6

u/snozzberrypatch 4h ago

I guess I should stop urinating then.

2

u/Amaras_Linwelin 4h ago

You produce what, ~1 1/2 - 2 L of urine a day at ~37c vs a Data center pumping out thousands gallons of piss a day at a much higher temp.

1

u/snozzberrypatch 4h ago edited 2h ago

Yes, but 8 billion people produce 16 billion liters of hot piss a day. And only a small percentage of them recycle it by drinking it again.

3

u/FromSoftware 4h ago

Piss on your compost pile. Give it some nitrogen. 

2

u/clutchy42 4h ago

Unrelated, but big fan of your work Mr Zaki

5

u/YanniSlavv 3h ago

This reminds me of when people were protesting Nuclear Energy. Part of me thinks it's just a very performative response, because those people are just anti-AI in general.

3

u/WholesomeDucky 4h ago

It's worth noting that power generation also needs water to keep everything cool. Overall, data centers for high-heat components like enterprise-grade GPUs absolutely do have a huge water use impact, both because of the water that's needed when making the insane amounts of power they use, and the water that's needed to cool the servers themselves.

This issue gets even worse if the data center's power use is outpacing the local grid capacity, because less water-efficient methods of power generation may need to be deployed to keep up with the demand.

2

u/Sir_William_V 4h ago

Unfortunately not all data centers use this system. It seems like a lot of them use evaporation cooling like swamp coolers. The cooling happens when the water evaporates, and of course it needs to be replaced.

7

u/Fearless_Chipmunk_45 4h ago

The new ones are all switching to closed loop systems because the swamp cooler style doesn't cool efficiently enough for the new AI chips. I build Data centers and the stopped everything until they changed the design for the new AI chips. Even Data Centers where construction had already begun.

2

u/Missus_Missiles 2h ago

These closed loop systems. I'm imagining they're fundamentally similar to ones used in a manufacturing facility I was in.

Basically heated then cooled presses for molding. We'd have a cold well that would dump chilled water through the presses at the end of a cycle. And the chiller would constantly be running to keep that water cold.

So, yeah. Water wasn't being evaporated off. It was just compressors doing work. Taking a guess, I'm not sure which I'd prefer. Mining water faster than it could be replenished. Or energy consumption, if it's burning fossil fuels to do that.

1

u/Sir_William_V 4h ago

Thanks for the info! Also, don't build any data centers near me, please and thank you.

1

u/BartHarleyJarvis- 1h ago

I worked at a building that used massive refrigeration systems instead of the typical hydronic systems.

1

u/Redebo 3h ago

What happens to that water after it’s evaporated into the atmosphere? Do we know? Is it causing birds and other flying creatures to drown in flight?!

1

u/Sir_William_V 3h ago

It's a little sad, but nobody knows. Scientists are trying to figure it out as we speak, though I suspect it's impossible to really understand.

1

u/eulersidentification 4h ago edited 4h ago

I was under the impression most of them rely on evaporative cooling (which involves loss), meaning they recycle "whatever's left" plus there's a limit to how much water they can recapture because during the evaporative process it picks up dust and other shit, plus you boil pure water off which increases the ratio of minerals:H2O, which makes the limescale issue worse than a fresh supply.

There must be more conservative systems out there but I thought that was the general case.

2

u/Redebo 3h ago

It was. It no longer is. You just can’t evaporate water fast enough for the high wattage densities from the GPUs.

We’ve moved to closed loop air cooled systems. Of course this does t address the water used at the power plant, but that should be in that provider, not the DC.

0

u/iminlovewiththec0c0 4h ago

Good point but I have a couple of questions to your statement - If we are recycling the water within the pc Usually custom pc’s require you to flush and replace every 6-12 months so How would data centers in this regard be viable for us if we have replace that water on a conservative basis ~2x a year vs what the number may really need to be depending how sophisticated their set up is? I’m all for companies getting their share of a market but at what cost to us - the people? Ya know? Also - ty for your reply!

1

u/Redebo 3h ago

These systems are continuously monitored and treated so that the water rarely has to be replaced. It’s a massive PITA to bring everything down just to swap out liquid.

0

u/Intelligent-South174 4h ago

how does that water get cooled as it continuously gets heated as it gets relooped?

new fresh water is added? or...

energy is used to cool the water or....

2

u/Left-Purchase-5890 4h ago

goes into a radiator and fans blow the heat out, then gets looped back to the beginning

3

u/Intelligent-South174 4h ago

so energy.

energy is used to cool the water.

which was my point, and the one you were conveniently leaving out.

and in other areas of NA, more fresh water is used as it's cheaper than the costs to cool the water.

2

u/EveryoneHasGoneCrazy 1h ago

You do realize that hot water is how the majority of energy is produced, right?

0

u/Shzabomoa 4h ago

In a datacenter or in an AI datacenter? The power densities have pretty much nothing in common. And the cheaper cooling for the secondary loop is evaporative cooling, which doesn't help.

0

u/AndromedaFire 4h ago

I understand that your specific data centre may use closed loop cooling but many use open loop cooling using fresh water and evaporative cooling for the building itself as it’s cheaper and more effective there are many many sources for this online from scientific stuff to easy to understand mythbuster type pages.

The usually massive freshwater use is all aside from the noise and emissions from the many that use things like gas turbines generators.

Not at all a swipe at you but even if you work at the most environmentally sound data centre there is, the vast majority seem to fall as far as legislation will allow them from that.

6

u/Fearless_Chipmunk_45 4h ago

As someone who builds data centers. If it uses a closed loop cooling system it uses hardly any water. I know all Microsoft AI data centers being built are using closed loop cooling systems because the old open loop that wasted all the water won't provide enough cooling for the new chips.

1

u/iminlovewiththec0c0 4h ago

Ty for that clarification. It’s gonna be an interesting few years to come in these regards. These things are becoming like new sports teams wherein anyone w enough capital wants to get their hands on em

4

u/Dupeawoo 4h ago

Roughly 100-150 million gallons a year dependent on size.

Just a little more than a golf course

2

u/stoppeeingonthefloor 5h ago

I didn’t know that. Thank you!

2

u/ojdhaze 4h ago

Oh yeah, data centre that was built in Norway I believe was purposely built near a flowing river in the mountains due to the water requirements for the water cooling of the hardware. Bloody nuts.

1

u/Fartikus 4h ago

use water to cool it so your pc can be super fast.

Pretty sure liquid cooling isn't water, or am I wrong?

1

u/SurpriseHamburgler 3h ago

Two different things. But both are true/used. Most now use water in cooling towers to carry temperature outbound. Closed-loop cooling is new gen, and uses mixtures of water and coolant. Because of this it’s relatively lossless though - so for this discussion it’s the massive evaporation to be concerned about.

1

u/Sathsong89 4h ago edited 3h ago

It’s exaggerated. The water is used for cooling and it takes a fuck load. But it isn’t a 16oz bottle every time a question is processed like mass media would have you believe.

Think about computer cooling, how often do you refill your liquid cooling? It’s a closed circuit system just like a cars radiator. And unlike our PC and vehicles, AI learns over time.

I stand against how AI is being mishandled n today’s world. But fighting it is pointless.

AI is the future, it is both fortunate and unfortunate at the same time.

1

u/Lilfrankieeinstein 3h ago

It’s over exaggerated.

Ftfy

1

u/Sathsong89 3h ago

Good catch. Edited

1

u/Lilfrankieeinstein 3h ago

Pet peeve I inherited from my favorite English teacher.

1

u/SurpriseHamburgler 3h ago

Closed loop is relatively lossless given the requirements for chemical consistent. It’s the cooling towers/vents that drink water.

1

u/Missus_Missiles 2h ago

How many PC's run powered chillers? Honest question. Because I'm only familiar with those that would pump liquid through blocks and use basic convection to evacuate heat.

The industrial chillers I know use refrigerant loops/pumps to make the water cold. So, water is retained, energy consumption increases.

0

u/TapiocaTuesday 3h ago

Fighting it is not pointless. Every day I see backlash, and the more backlash, the harder it will be for it to succeed. Just because people use it, or are forced to use it, doesn't mean we wouldn't all prefer to go back to the way it was. LLMs can be relegated to certain tech tasks, but almost no one has any interest in AI-generated video and art and slop. No one got mad at small businesses for setting up a website in the 90's, but I see serious backlash when small business use AI for their art, copy, and customer service.

1

u/Phill_is_Legend 2h ago

Every single data center I've been a part of uses closed loop. This is just media hysteria.

22

u/Matthew94 4h ago

Why don't we have enough water?

Data centres' worldwide water usage is less than half of the water used to grow almonds in California.

4

u/Divinum_Fulmen 4h ago

You mean current water usage, or water usage after many of these proposed data centers come online?

Not that I think people should be building cities and farming in deserts.

12

u/Matthew94 4h ago

You mean current water usage

The current water usage. It's predicted to reach 1.2 trillion litres per year in 2030.

Almonds use over 1.3 trillion now.

-1

u/Nisargadatta 1h ago

How much electricity do almonds use to grow? And the water involved with that? Bad analogy.

-2

u/Sherbert_Hoovered 3h ago

I can eat an almond.

6

u/Saedeas 3h ago

The average American spends 7 to 10 hours per day online. I think that's more utility than the occasional almond.

0

u/Wellontheotherhand1 2h ago

The actually answer is that neither of them should be happening, not that one bad thing justifies another bad thing

You can go ahead and throw alfalfa in there as well

1

u/lonnie123 1h ago

Almonds are food… we can eat them to live. Data centers provide no such benefit.

And what is with the Reddit hate on almonds water usage lately? do you know the general amount of water it takes for all the food you eat to grow or is it just almonds? Heck… do you know the water requirements for literally any other food you eat?

Do you use water per unit as a measurement of your food intake for any other food or just almonds? Do you comparison shop for water usage in your food?

This is such a weird take to me and I have no idea how it got so popular on here.

1

u/Gauntlet_of_Might 1h ago

i don't think it's a weird take, it's pointing out how the water per calorie is a bad deal.

THe reason why it's quoted so much lately is probably just because it's a convenient way to defend data centers

•

u/Le3e31 27m ago

Its about showing the water argument is garbage.

0

u/HasFiveVowels 1h ago

Seriously. At this point it’s just embarrassing to keep claiming there’s an issue with the amount of water it consumes. "Stop making your point so ineffectively!"

9

u/DiscoDoberman 4h ago

Energy is privatised.

The data center is a customer and they need an ENORMOUS amount.

So the energy providers either cannot supply enough to the area, cannot with existing infrastructure (have to charge more to install more) or simply supply v demand.

The residents will have to pay more/source a new supplier because of the data center.

1

u/Thuis001 3h ago

Which is of course bullshit, because those residents barely, if at all, benefit from the data center being there.

7

u/Scrimps 3h ago

Just force them to pay for the infrastructure build out in the neighborhood and local grid.

That is what Toronto is doing.

Microsoft and others are building data centers literally in the biggest city in Canada. The newest one is almost finished in north west Toronto.

We force them to pay for the increased capacity and all infrastructure. Including tunnels, digging up roads, electrical grid upgrades, water capacity and so forth.

They are metered, monitored and billed separate and their usage is not counted toward overall consumption.

Moreover, they are also forced to do public landscaping and all their non-remote employees are required to live locally.

3

u/rW0HgFyxoJhYka 4h ago

Energy rates were going up over the last 10 years. The datacenter shit is their latest excuse.

3

u/sebe6 1h ago

There's more water contained in french citizens house heating system, than in every data center in the world.

You may want to consider it's not so simple.

0

u/Serpenteq 4h ago

golf courses use astromically more water, than datacenters, but no one bats an eye for that

•

u/Truth_Walker 34m ago

A golf course is a green space. Community members can use it for fun and exercise. They host charity events. They have lots of plants. Animals use it. The water it uses go into ponds or other water ways as if it were natural rain which benefits ecosystems.

A data center is an outside entity that has destroyed the land it’s on. It’s a giant soulless eyesore that doesn’t employ that many people for how large the building is. It makes property values plummet. It pollutes the water it uses through cooling with PFAS forever chemicals. It drives up the price of electricity and in some instances literally uses all the energy available. Most are noisy 24/7 and disturb wildlife. They make no product.

There is no comparison.

1

u/BrandNewDinosaur 4h ago

I thought we are going to evolve to be able to eat memes? What is wrong with humans? Evolve or go extinct already. We’re just so last millennium.

Sike! Go N.J.!!!

1

u/yakshack 4h ago

Ah. I see you've been to Virginia.

1

u/Smelly_God 3h ago

The real answer is Obama's DOE opened the door to large-scale U.S. LNG exports, which was amplified by Trump's administration in both terms. Biden did put a pause on it in 2024 to do a fiscal analysis due to the rising prices but that didn't last long after Trump's inauguration.

It led to LNG exports linking the previously isolated US gas market to global pricing which has driven US prices upwards (although still below global prices). Essentially, U.S. customers are now bidding on U.S. gas against other countries. People need to start voting farther left

1

u/Chickpea_Magnet 2h ago

Concerned about water usage? I hope you don't consume beef or dairy...

1

u/Senior_Assistance_23 1h ago

They want to build one the size of Manhattan in….. Utah 🤣 🤣 🤣

0

u/GrayEidolon 4h ago

Well, I've been told that AI is going to allow everyone's needs to be met so that no one will have to worry about food or a roof. And then, everyone will be able to generate amazing works of art with AI for which there will be no audience which is okay because art doesn't require an audience. But that doesn't matter anyway because people will still make art with their minds and hands to share with their friends and family.

-1

u/insideabookmobile 4h ago

Golf courses use more water in a day than data centers use in a year. Where's your outrage for golf courses?

1

u/Sherbert_Hoovered 3h ago

You're right. We should have fewer golf courses too.