Greenpeace report How Clean is Your Cloud? I saw mentioned in 3T magazine news is actually quite interesting reading. This year’s report provides a look at the energy choices some of the largest and fastest growing IT companies. The report analyzes the 14 IT companies and the electricity supply chain in more than 80 data center cases.
The report contains also lots of interesting background information on both IT and telecom energy consumption. I recommend checking it out. Here are some points picked from How Clean is Your Cloud? report:
Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, Google, and Yahoo – these global brands and a host of other IT companies are rapidly and fundamentally transforming the way in which we work, communicate, watch movies or TV, listen to music, and share pictures through “the cloud.”
The growth and scale of investment in the cloud is truly mind-blowing, with estimates of a 50-fold increase in the amount of digital information by 2020 and nearly half a trillion in investment in the coming year, all to create and feed our desire for ubiquitous access to infinite information from our computers, phones and other mobile devices, instantly.
The engine that drives the cloud is the data center. Data centers are the factories of the 21st century information age, containing thousands of computers that store and manage our rapidly growing collection of data for consumption at a moment’s notice. Given the energy-intensive nature of maintaining the cloud, access to significant amounts of electricity is a key factor in decisions about where to build these data centers. Industry leaders estimate nearly $450bn US dollars is being spent annually on new data center space.
Since electricity plays a critical role in the cost structure of companies that use the cloud, there have been dramatic strides made in improving the energy efficiency design of the facilities and the thousands of computers that go inside. However, despite significant improvements in efficiency, the exponential growth in cloud computing far outstrips these energy savings.
How much energy is required to power the ever-expanding online world? What percentage of global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions is attributable to the IT sector? Answers to these questions are very difficult to obtain with any degree of precision, partially due to the sector’s explosive growth, a wide range of devices and energy sources, and rapidly changing technology and business models. The estimates of the IT sector’s carbon footprint performed to date have varied widely in their methodology and scope. One of the most recognized estimates of the IT sector’s footprint was conducted as part of the 2008 SMART 2020 study, which established that the sector is responsible for 2% of global GHG emissions.
The combined electricity demand of the internet/cloud (data centers and telecommunications network) globally in 2007 was approximately 623bn kWh (if the cloud were a country, it would have the fifth largest electricity demand in the world). Based on current projections, the demand for electricity will more than triple to 1,973bn kWh (an amount greater than combined total demand of France, Germany, Canada and Brazil).
The report indicates that, due to the economic downturn and continued energy efficiency and performance improvements, global energy demand from data centers from 2005-2010 increased by 56%. Estimates of data center electricity demand come in at 31GW globally, with an increase of 19% in 2012 alone. At the same time global electricity consumption is otherwise essentially flat due to the global recession is still a staggering rate of growth.
Given the scale of predicted growth, the source of electricity must be factored into a meaningful definition of “green IT”. Energy efficiency alone will, at best, slow the growth of the sector’s footprint. The replacement of dirty sources of electricity with clean renewable sources is still the crucial missing link in the sector’s sustainability efforts according to the report.
The global telecoms sector is also growing rapidly. Rapid growth in use of smart phones and broadband mobile connections mean mobile data traffic in 2011 was eight times the size of the entire internet in 2000. It is estimated that global mobile data traffic grew 133% in 2011, with 597 petabytes of data sent by mobiles every month. In 2011, it is estimated that 6 billion people or 86.7% of the entire global population have mobile telephone subscriptions. By the end of 2012, the number of mobile connected devices is expected to exceed the global population. Electronic devices and the rapidly growing cloud that supports our demand for greater online access are clearly a significant force in driving global energy demand.
What about telecoms in the developing and newly industrialized countries? The report has some details from India (by the way it is expected that India will pass China to become the world’s largest mobile market in terms of subscriptions in 2012). Much of the growth in the Indian telecom sector is from India’s rural and semi-urban areas. By 2012, India is likely to have 200 million rural telecom connections at a penetration rate of 25%. Out of the existing 400,000 mobile towers, over 70% exist in rural and semi-urban areas where either grid-connected electricity is not available or the electricity supply is irregular. As a result, mobile towers and, increasingly, grid-connected towers in these areas rely on diesel generators to power their network operations. The consumption of diesel by the telecoms sector currently stands at a staggering 3bn liters annually, second only to the railways in India.
What is the case on other developing and newly industrialized countries? I don’t actually know.
NOTE: Please note that that many figures given on the report are just estimates based on quite little actual data, so they might be somewhat off the actual figures. Given the source of the report I would quess that if the figures are off, they are most probably off to direction so that the environmental effect looks bigger than it actually is.
1,146 Comments
Tomi Engdahl says:
Evaporative cooling (often deployed as cooling towers, adiabatic fluid coolers, or direct evaporative media) had its golden era as the dominant, go-to standard for hyperscale data centers roughly between 2008 and 2021.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Evaporative cooling (often deployed as cooling towers, adiabatic fluid coolers, or direct evaporative media) had its golden era as the dominant, go-to standard for hyperscale data centers roughly between 2008 and 2021. There are still many data centers from this era operating.
The Global Installed Base (~20% to 30%)
Across all operational data centers worldwide (enterprise on-premises, colocation, and hyperscale), evaporative and adiabatic cooling systems represent roughly 20% to 30% of total cooling infrastructure.
In the hyperscale sector (AWS, Google, Meta, Microsoft), direct or indirect evaporative cooling was historically installed in over 50% of facilities built during the 2010s.
Reports show that roughly 75% to 85% of the total water withdrawn by major cloud providers for cooling evaporates directly into the atmosphere.
Google reported withdrawing over 7.8 billion gallons globally in 2024, with 78% consumed via evaporation.
The Collapse in New Construction (<10% of New Builds)
While legacy facilities still run evaporative loops, new data center construction has rapidly pivoted away from evaporative cooling, where its share of new deployments has dropped below 10%
Tomi Engdahl says:
use of misinformation, calculations based on wrong data, data centers use and generative AI is strong in anti AI data center movement. This really hurts the credibility of getting their message through.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1EgkVPK42S/
A single water-use number can make AI data centers look much simpler than they are. In Texas, officials have ordered stronger enforcement of reporting rules after concerns that some facilities may not have supplied the required information. The catch is that closed-loop cooling, evaporative cooling, climate, electricity sources, and the way researchers count water can all change the number. That is why the claim that every Texas or New Mexico data center uses 10 times more water than reported is not established fact. The bigger question is how much water AI infrastructure uses directly and indirectly in places where water is already under pressure.
One detail matters here. Water used to generate the electricity powering a data center can be counted separately from water consumed at the facility itself, which makes comparisons surprisingly difficult. Better reporting could make those two footprints much easier to see.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Amazon’s global data center water use represents roughly 0.075% of the water Americans use annually just to water lawns and gardens. From a macro national budget perspective, residential lawn care consumes much more water than computing infrastructure. Americans use vastly more water on grass lawns (~3.3 trillion gallons/year) than all cloud and AI data centers use for cooling (~17–20 billion gallons/year).
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/186McGHLi2/
AI may exist primarily in the digital world, but the infrastructure powering it is very physical.
Modern data centers require huge quantities of computing equipment, electricity and cooling infrastructure. Some cooling systems consume significant amounts of water, while others use air cooling or closed-loop designs that can substantially reduce direct water consumption.
The electricity requirement is becoming particularly important. Large AI campuses can request hundreds of megawatts of power, putting pressure on utilities to build additional generation, substations and transmission infrastructure.
Land is another consideration. Hyperscale campuses can occupy large areas and may require roads, backup generators, cooling equipment and supporting electrical infrastructure.
The environmental footprint also varies significantly from one facility to another. A data center powered primarily by renewable electricity can have a different operational carbon footprint from one relying heavily on fossil-fuel generation, while cooling technology can dramatically change water requirements.
As AI expands, communities are increasingly asking for more transparent information about these impacts before major projects are approved.
#AIDataCenters #ArtificialIntelligence #WaterSecurity #EnergyDemand #SustainableTechnology
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1BtKKHwSRL/
Texas’s data-center pipeline has reached an extraordinary theoretical scale. ERCOT was tracking more than 1,800 large-load projects representing over 474 GW of potential electricity demand, and about 90% of those requests were associated with data centers.
But the most important word is “potential.” The 474 GW is not current consumption and does not mean Texas is preparing to build 474 GW of data centers immediately.
ERCOT and industry representatives have said many projects in the queue are unlikely to be completed because they do not yet have financing, customers or other commitments necessary for construction. The enormous queue has nevertheless made it difficult for ERCOT to produce reliable forecasts of future demand.
That distinction makes the number even more interesting. The queue represents how much electricity developers are asking the Texas grid to accommodate if their projects materialize.
The challenge now is filtering speculative requests from projects that will actually be built—and then determining how much generation and transmission Texas needs to support the facilities that survive that process.
#Texas #DataCenters #AIInfrastructure #ERCOT #ElectricityDemand
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/19CTCHzcfG/
Dublin is showing what happens when one kind of infrastructure grows much faster than the grid around it. Data centers now account for around 79% of electricity demand in Dublin, according to Carbon Brief’s reporting of analysis from the Öko-Institut. Ireland has had to add generation, transmission capacity and new ways to manage connections for large users, while the claim that data centers alone have made Irish families pay 40% more for electricity needs much more caution. Household prices also reflect fuel costs, network charges, taxes and supply conditions, but Dublin still leaves one big question hanging over the AI boom: who gets access to limited electricity when the servers arrive first? #Dublin #DataCenters #AIInfrastructure #ElectricityDemand #Energy
Ireland’s grid has had to plan around the unusual concentration of data centers by adding generation, transmission capacity and measures for connecting large new users. The 79% figure is striking because these facilities run continuously, alongside homes, businesses and other industries competing for the same electricity system.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1RBLaqqq7d/
The Vatican has officially declared environmental destruction a ”sin against creation and the Creator” in a major new doctrinal text.
The 29,000-word document, titled Caring for Our Common Home, elevates ecological concern from a merely political or scientific issue into a direct matter of personal faith.
Authorized under Pope Leo XIV, the text declares that destroying natural habitats, polluting, and exploiting resources are not just civic failures, but a ‘sin against creation and against the Creator’ that directly violates God’s plan.
This shift from Pope Francis’ earlier concept of ‘ecological sin’ to a more explicit ‘sin against the Creator’ is designed to reshape how believers view their daily environmental impact. The Vatican emphasizes that failing to safeguard the planet severely harms the poorest populations and future generations, distorting the core relationships that define humanity. By placing ecological action squarely in the realm of moral responsibility, the Church is challenging millions of people to treat environmental care as a fundamental requirement of their faith.
source: O’Connell, G. (2026). Vatican theological commission defines ‘sin against creation and the Creator’ in new document. America Magazine.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The Trump administration is repealing limits on greenhouse gas emissions emitted by the nation’s fossil fuel-fired power plants. The head of the Environmental Protection Agency called it the largest deregulatory action of the U.S. power sector in history.
https://www.npr.org/2026/09/14/nx-s1-5968785/epa-repeals-pollution-limits-on-power-plants
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.americamagazine.org/news/2026/09/03/vatican-creation-sin/
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/14sNR1dQL3a/
Oregon has a data center problem. And for the first time, researchers have put numbers to it.
A new report from ECOnorthwest and the University of Virginia — the first of its kind since the AI-driven data center boom began — documents the size and scope of the industry in Oregon.
Here’s what they found:
·111 operational data centers, taking up 22.1 million square feet.
·32 more planned or under construction, adding 6.9 million square feet.
·Data centers account for 23% of Oregon’s retail electricity sales in 2025.
·They directly employ 2,630 workers — about 0.2% of the state’s workforce.
·Data center demand is projected to hit 25 terawatt hours by 2030 — roughly 31% to 32% of all electricity demand in the state, equal to 2.5 million homes.
The costs are staggering. Oregon data centers receive an estimated $457 million a year in property tax exemptions. Meanwhile, the state’s data center buildout has corresponded with a 50% increase in Portland General Electric and Pacific Power customers’ energy bills. In July 2026, the Oregon PUC approved a 29% rate increase for data centers while lowering residential bills by 1.3%.
The report also highlighted a critical gap: inconsistent, incomplete, or unavailable data on water use. Senator Ron Wyden has demanded answers from Big Tech executives, noting that many communities in my state are concerned about how these centers could contribute to water scarcity in the coming years, especially as our state grapples with persistent drought. In The Dalles, Google alone accounts for roughly 40% of the city’s total water usage.
Data center electricity demand is increasing substantially, the report says. Accommodating large-load growth will require new electricity resources, transmission capacity, and coordinated infrastructure planning.
The report also found that Oregon has two separate data center markets: large hyperscale facilities concentrated in Eastern Oregon, and smaller, multi-tenant facilities planned for the western side of the state.
SOURCES: Mashable | OPB | Planetizen | ECOnorthwest | University of Virginia | Oregon PUC | Senator Ron Wyden
Tomi Engdahl says:
Rather than waiting for federal mandates, hyperscalers (Microsoft, Google, Amazon, and Meta) are actively financing nuclear restarts and Small Modular Reactors (SMRs) to build their own dedicated power supplies.
Legislative Action: U.S. lawmakers have introduced protections (such as the Ratepayer Protection Act) to mandate that data centers consuming over 100 MW pay for their own dedicated grid upgrades and power generation, preventing cost-shifting onto residential utility customers.
”Behind-the-Meter” SMRs: By placing SMRs directly on-site at data center campuses, the facility operates independently of the public grid. This avoids transmission line congestion, reduces grid stress, and prevents local electricity prices from rising.
Tomi Engdahl says:
In USA they have built very many data centers that consume lots of water to places where there is shortage of water. The electrical power them also consumes lots of water and produces lots of CO2.
In Finland and Sweden data centers consume nearly no water at all and there is no water shortage. Also the electrical power used is much more “green”.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The Claim: Cooling towers create environments for Legionella bacteria growth.
The Reality: True.
Legionella thrives in warm, stagnant water (70°F–115°F) containing organic matter or biofilm—conditions frequently present in industrial evaporative cooling towers.
If cooling towers are not continuously treated with biocides, Legionella can proliferate and be dispersed into the surrounding air via water droplets, causing Legionnaires’ disease (a severe form of pneumonia). This risk is a standard, well-documented engineering challenge for any wet-cooling industrial setup, including data centers.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1Bsu1PaAJz/
Erin Brockovich says AI data centers put water, power, land, and health on the table.
Erin Brockovich is urging greater transparency around AI data centers as communities raise concerns about water, power, land and health. Her tracker listed 9,580 community reports across all 50 states as of September 10, with water the leading concern at 41.2%. EESI says a large data center can use up to five million gallons of water daily.
#DataCenters #ArtificialIntelligence #photography
References:
PBS Amanpour & Company:Erin Brockovich Is Taking On a New Issue: AI Data Centers.
EESI:EESI Impact Explains Data Center Water Use and Growing Electricity Demand Across America.
Brockovich Data Center Reporting:Community Reports Statistics Track Water, Electricity, Health and Transparency Concerns Nationwide.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The sudden explosion in data center construction feels unprecedented because the industry transitioned from linear, efficiency-driven growth to an exponential, power-heavy expansion.
Era 1: On-Premises & Early Web (2000–2010)
Era 2: The Cloud & Streaming Era (2010–2022)
Era 3: The AI & High-Density Compute Surge (2023–Present)
The boom in Generative AI and modern high-performance compute fundamentally broke the efficiency curve. While the total number of physical buildings hasn’t multiplied tenfold, the power capacity packed inside each square foot has scaled exponentially.
Tomi Engdahl says:
There is a long history of people pro and against progress. Lots of promises, lying, FUD, misinformation, political talk, propaganda, demonstrations, riots, damaging new tech, etc…
Tomi Engdahl says:
The construction company that build the data center building will make money, the companies that sell servers make good money (the companies that build chips make good profit), the companies that sell networking hardware, companies that sell on site electrical power distribution, backup generators, cooling systems, those who install those to site…. investor makes money when things run smoothly and the companies that rent capacity with long time agreement do not collapse…
The USA infrastructure has been decaying for decades, and I don’t see that the data centers would help solving the infrastructure decay unless they absolutely need some updates (without which they would not be able to build the site). Data centers do not seem to want to give back to infrastructure anything more than they need based on legislation, local policies and agreements.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1DbfXdbcDF/
Burning the earth to make AI-generated cartoons and fake photos has to be the dumbest time to be alive.
MIT Technology Review estimated that a high-quality five-second video made with the open-source CogVideoX model used about 3.4 million joules—over 700 times the energy of a high-quality generated image and comparable to running a microwave for more than an hour. The IEA says data centers still rely substantially on fossil-fuel electricity, though energy mixes vary by region.
#ArtificialIntelligence #EnergyUse #photography
References:
MIT Technology Review:We Did the Math on AI’s Energy Footprint and What It Means.
International Energy Agency:Energy and AI Report Examines Electricity Demand, Supply, Emissions, and Future Growth.
International Energy Agency:Energy Supply for AI Shows How Data Centers Draw Power Across Global Grids.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1EA3sprjo9/
Clean Water Still Comes First
Data centers power much of the modern digital world, but access to clean water remains a fundamental human need.
Modern data centers can use substantial amounts of water for cooling, depending on their cooling technology and local climate. As computing demand grows, researchers and policymakers are examining how increased data-center activity could affect electricity systems and water resources.
That doesn’t mean every data center threatens drinking-water supplies. The impact depends heavily on location, cooling technology, water sources, climate, and how facilities manage or recycle water.
The challenge is finding ways to expand digital infrastructure while using energy and water responsibly — protecting the natural resources that communities depend on every day.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1K2r5Z7jRk/
Winona LaDuke: “Why does wanting clean drinking water make you an act*vist?”
Clean drinking water is essential for public health. Industrial and other pollution can introduce metals, PFAS, petroleum-related compounds, and other contaminants into rivers, lakes, and groundwater. Some pollutants can persist for years and create health risks with enough exposure. Groundwater cleanup can be slow and complex, making prevention and source protection especially important.
#photography #CleanWater #Environment
References:
World Health Organization:Drinking-water guidance explains contamination risks, health impacts, sanitation, and the importance of safe water.
U.S. EPA:Current research explains potential human health and environmental risks linked to certain PFAS exposures.
U.S. EPA:Water research examines PFAS contamination, treatment methods, risk management, and protection of water resources.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1HFnLG9iah/
A single AI data center could use as much electricity as roughly 770,000 homes in the United States.
Colossus 2 in Memphis has an estimated 946 megawatts of computing-power capacity, according to research organization Epoch AI. That is nearly one gigawatt, or a billion watts.
As of September 2026, it ranks as the largest operational AI data center in Epoch’s tracked dataset by that measure.
The household comparison helps explain the scale.
If its computing equipment ran at 946 megawatts continuously for a year, it would consume about 8.3 billion kilowatt-hours. Using the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s 2022 average, that equals the annual electricity purchases of roughly 770,000 residential customers.
That is a capacity-based calculation. Actual consumption depends on how heavily the equipment runs, and cooling and other facility systems require additional electricity.
Inside AI data centers, specialized chips perform enormous numbers of calculations to train models and respond to users. Those chips produce heat that must be removed to keep the equipment operating.
Supplying power at this scale requires much more than connecting a building to an existing line.
Utilities and developers must coordinate electricity generation, transmission, substations, equipment deliveries, and construction schedules. New infrastructure can take years to complete.
The Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas identifies coordination between the technology and energy industries as a major bottleneck in the expansion.
Colossus 2 also illustrates how companies are responding: natural-gas turbines were installed across the state border in Mississippi to help supply the site.
As more facilities expand, decisions about their power sources and infrastructure costs will shape both their environmental impact and the communities supporting them.
Learn more:
“America’s Largest Data Center Uses More Electricity Than Houston.” Climate Crisis 247
Tomi Engdahl says:
A quick google search will tell you that the United States consumes about 322 billion gallons of water PER DAY. About 41% is used to cool power plants (not data centers). About 37% is used to grow food. About 12% is residential.
So you’re correct. Its really stupid to tell people to stop watering their lawns. But its even more stupid to tell people that data centers are going to take all of our water.
There are a lot of good reasons to oppose data centers.. Water use just isn’t one of them.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Water used in cooling systems is treated with specific chemicals—such as biocides (chlorine/bromine compounds), scale inhibitors, and corrosion inhibitors:
To Protect Plumbing & Heat Exchangers: Heating and evaporating tap water leaves behind mineral deposits (calcium, magnesium) and creates a breeding ground for bacteria (like Legionella) and algae.
To Prevent Corrosion: Chemicals balance the pH and form protective films inside the facility’s pipes and heat exchange loops.
Tomi Engdahl says:
In Arizona, 72% of all water use in the desert goes to Agriculture, that could happen back East, where they get rain. 2% goes on golf courses and about 0.125% goes on Data Centers.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Data centers have been actively built for for more than two decades. Big data cebters used to be built using energy saving a lot of water consuming cooling tech. Now industry has shifted to use cooling technologies that do not consume any or very little water for cooling – Europe is leading this development and USA big players have built data centers thus way.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Data centers have been around for over 25 years. They don’t run on water. You are posting in one now. Where do you think they store all the data being saved, personal data, social media, streaming material, TV, movies, Amazon, and all the other retailers? Data centers are the “Cloud”. China is driving this propaganda, so America will fall behind in the AI technology.
Tomi Engdahl says:
While concerns about water scarcity are valid, comparing agriculture to data centers leaves out crucial context:
1. Agricultural Water Use Dwarfs Data Centers
Agriculture: U.S. crop irrigation uses roughly 43 trillion gallons of water annually. Animal feed crops alone (corn, fodder) use over 5.5 trillion gallons.
Value Add VC
+ 1
Data Centers: All U.S. data centers combined use roughly 17.4 billion gallons on-site per year. That means U.S. crop irrigation uses over 2,400 times more water than data centers.
Value Add VC
Everyday Comparison: U.S. lawn watering (2.9 trillion gallons) and even household pipe leaks (900 billion gallons) waste far more water each year than the entire data center sector.
Value Add VC
2. Modern Technology Recycles Water
Most modern data centers run on closed-loop, direct-to-chip, or air-cooling systems that continually recirculate the same water rather than constantly draining local supplies.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Most data centers globally use standard air cooling (zero on-site water). Evaporative cooling is used by a subset of large-scale facilities, not “most data centers.”
The claim that “most data centers use evaporative cooling” is incorrect.
While evaporative systems get the most news coverage due to their high water consumption, they are not the dominant method across the total global data center footprint.
Across all global data center infrastructure (enterprise, colocation, edge, and cloud), traditional air-based cooling represents roughly 65% to 68% of the total market.
Evaporative cooling (cooling towers or direct evaporative media) is primarily used by large hyperscale facilities (like AWS, Google, Microsoft, Meta) built in specific regions.
The fastest-growing technology for AI data centers is closed-loop liquid cooling (such as direct-to-chip or immersion cooling).
More: https://www.snsinsider.com/reports/data-centre-cooling-market-5517?utm_source=gemini&hl=en-US#:~:text=By%20Solution%2C%20air%20conditioning%20dominates%2C%20liquid%20cooling,effective%20for%20rack%20densities%20below%2010%20kW.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1BuS8EX7st/
The AI boom has a power problem that is getting harder to hide. Microsoft, Google and Amazon are expanding data centers at the same time their electricity use and emissions are rising, with Amazon reporting greenhouse-gas emissions up more than 16% in 2025 and electricity use up 34%. Renewable-energy certificates and power-purchase agreements can help fund cleaner energy, but they do not mean every data center is running on renewable power every hour. The strange part is that the same companies are investing in cleaner electricity while consuming far more of it, leaving one question behind: can efficiency gains keep pace with the scale of AI growth?
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1XuQAuMbYs/
AI may feel weightless and digital, but every prompt is processed inside physical infrastructure that consumes electricity, water and land.
As artificial intelligence spreads across healthcare, education, business and entertainment, the powerful chips behind it require enormous amounts of computing capacity. Data centers also need cooling equipment, electrical infrastructure and dependable energy around the clock.
The U.S. Department of Energy estimates that data centers consumed approximately 4.4% of all U.S. electricity in 2023. Depending on the pace of expansion, that share could rise to between 6.7% and 12% by 2028. Their climate impact depends heavily on where the electricity comes from, while water consumption varies according to the cooling system, local climate and power source.
This does not mean AI and environmental responsibility are incompatible. More efficient chips, improved cooling, cleaner electricity, recycled water, transparent reporting and responsible site selection can all reduce the burden. AI may also help optimize power grids, buildings and industrial systems—but those potential benefits do not erase the resources required to operate it.
The real question is not whether innovation should continue. It is whether companies, regulators and communities will ensure that its environmental costs are measured honestly and reduced rather than shifted onto the public.
Progress should be judged not only by what technology can do, but by how responsibly we choose to build it.
Tomi Engdahl says:
“everything I’ve read said utilities have doubled where AI were put in, wasted agricultural land, and polluted the water.”
This claim takes three real infrastructure challenges—electricity rate hikes, land use, and water quality—and exaggerates them into sweeping doom narratives.
Claim 1: “Utilities have doubled where AI was put in”
VERDICT: False (Heavily Exaggerated).
National average residential electricity rates in the U.S. have risen roughly 15% to 25% over the last four years due to broader inflation, rising natural gas prices, and grid-hardening against severe weather. In heavy data-center hubs (like Northern Virginia or Ohio), rates have climbed faster, but nowhere near 100% (doubling) solely because of data centers.
Claim 2: “They wasted agricultural land”
VERDICT: Context-Dependent (Tiny Fraction of Farmland).
All data centers in the U.S. combined occupy an estimated 15,000 to 20,000 acres total—a microscopic fraction (<0.002\%) of agricultural land.
Farmland is lost primarily to suburban residential sprawl, highway infrastructure, and commercial logistics warehouses, not server buildings.
Claim 3: "They polluted the water"
VERDICT: False.
While systemic chemical pollution is rare, specific local incidents and lawsuits do occur.
When comparing water pollution cases against the ~3,000+ U.S. data center facilities:
Systemic Toxic Pollution is False: Data centers do not produce chemical sludge or dump untreated hazardous manufacturing waste.
Specific Local Cases are Real: Highly publicized legal disputes center around construction runoff, thermal water discharge, and concentrated cooling tower blowdown going into municipal sewers.
The Technological Shift: Modern AI facilities deploying closed-loop dry cooling and direct liquid-to-chip systems eliminate cooling tower blowdown entirely, systematically reducing operational wastewater risks.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Fertilizers… power plant discharges.. septic run offs… all this has been destroying the water for years now everyone wants to jump on this as the problem. They are a problem when it comes to and heat but closed loop systems don’t hurt the water supply.
Tomi Engdahl says:
John Niblett I very highly doubt that data centres will be in orbit in any short time any significant replacement for data centers in the ground. There are big engineering and logistic challenges with data centers on orbit. There will be some small scale data centers in the orbit, but I highly doubt that they would represent anything more than drop in the ocean of total data center capacity.
Elon Musk’s orbital data center strategy aims to bypass Earth’s land, water, and power grid constraints by leveraging Starship, Starlink, and xAI. However, the economic and practical viability of orbital compute will depend on solving thermal radiation, radiation hardening, and orbital debris management at scale.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Looking across all operational hyperscale facilities globally, open/indirect evaporative cooling accounts for roughly 45% to 55% of active capacity, while closed-loop systems (dry cooling and liquid-to-chip) make up 45% to 55%.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Historical Weight: Evaporative cooling was the industry default for hyperscalers built between 2010 and 2021. As a result, major operators report that 70% to 80% of their direct operational water footprint still stems from evaporative cooling towers running at these established sites.
Regional Split: Evaporative cooling remains concentrated in temperate regions where ambient humidity permits high-efficiency evaporative economizers.
Tomi Engdahl says:
“The only thing wrong with data centers are the lies that are being told and the people who believe the lies!”
Tomi Engdahl says:
If evaluated purely on time spent, direct labor, and energy consumed during the creation of a single file, standard AI image generation is mathematically far less resource-intensive per output than a human creating art from scratch.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1Dq6E5B9r1/
Modern society increasingly depends on data centers. They power cloud computing, digital services, AI systems, online communication and countless businesses.
But unlike clean water, data centers are not a biological necessity for human survival.
That distinction becomes important as electricity and water demand from rapidly expanding digital infrastructure receives greater attention. Some data centers consume substantial amounts of water directly for cooling, while others use air cooling, closed-loop systems or alternative technologies.
At the same time, communities around the world face water scarcity, pollution and increasing pressure on freshwater resources.
The question is therefore larger than technology itself: how should societies balance digital infrastructure growth with essential environmental resources?
The answer isn’t necessarily to stop building data centers. It is to consider where they are located, how efficiently they use water and electricity, and whether alternative cooling and water-reuse systems can reduce their environmental footprint.
Technology serves society—but essential resources ultimately sustain it.
#WaterSecurity #DataCenters #AIInfrastructure #Sustainability #CleanWater
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1ZrqBcsqY9/
NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang has pushed back against claims that the rapid expansion of AI data centers is automatically harmful to communities. His argument is that the enormous investment flowing into AI infrastructure can help finance new power generation, grid upgrades, and other infrastructure that may serve communities beyond the data centers themselves.
There is some evidence supporting part of that argument. Major technology companies are increasingly paying for power and infrastructure connected to their facilities. Meta, for example, says it pays for the energy and water used by its data centers and has invested hundreds of millions of dollars in water and wastewater infrastructure. These investments can provide broader infrastructure benefits when they are structured properly.
Huang has also highlighted changes in data-center cooling. New AI facilities can use closed-loop liquid-cooling systems that circulate the same coolant repeatedly instead of constantly consuming fresh water for cooling. Meta says most of its newest AI-optimized facilities use this approach, while other new projects are also adopting low-water or air-assisted cooling designs.
But saying that AI data centers have little or no local environmental impact would go too far. Their electricity demand is substantial, and the effect can vary dramatically depending on the location, power system, cooling technology, and available water resources. During the 2026 U.S. heatwave, utilities and regulators raised concerns that data-center growth was advancing faster than some electricity and water infrastructure could expand.
Public concern is also measurable. A September 2026 survey of 3,424 U.S. adults found that 63% were very or extremely concerned that data centers could increase electricity prices, while 57% expressed similar concern about local water supplies. The same survey found that 53% were highly concerned about AI’s overall environmental impact.
The debate is becoming important enough that governments are responding. California recently enacted legislation requiring greater oversight of data centers, including issues involving electricity costs and water use. The European Commission has also proposed rules requiring large European data centers to disclose energy and water-efficiency information.
The reality is more complicated than either AI data centers are destroying communities or AI data centers have no environmental cost. Some facilities are investing heavily in energy, water, and grid infrastructure, while others can place significant pressure on local systems. The outcome depends on how projects are designed, who pays for new infrastructure, where the electricity comes from, and how scarce local resources are managed.
AI infrastructure is growing rapidly. The real question is whether that growth can deliver economic and technological benefits without shifting its costs onto the communities that host it.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Nearly 25 percent of residents can’t afford their utility bills. https://trib.al/MeXYR2P
With Great power
Electricity Is Becoming Unbelievably Expensive as the US Power Grid Decays Into Ruin
Shocking.
https://futurism.com/electricity-usa-expensive-decaying?fbclid=IwdGRjcAUjgYFjbGNrBSOBamV4dG4DYWVtAjExAHBkb2YFc3J0YwZhcHBfaWQMMzUwNjg1NTMxNzI4AAEeg_f2vEPY-gQ8u561UnUmyS8IPPf9xYOB887qtEKi2ubOZDVODzpw4-hSRdQ_aem_SbnBMn5m_7J2c3tPPipmjQ
The US electrical grid is facing a stress test like never before. Thanks to a perfect storm of AI power consumption, climate crisis, crony capitalism, and a president bent on uprooting perfectly good energy infrastructure, the country’s already-struggling power system is rapidly crumbling as costs balloon into the stratosphere.
A recent analysis by Bloomberg underscores just how dire it’s getting. In the country’s largest continuous grid — a 13-state monstrosity managed by PJM Interconnection LLC — the media company notes that power costs have set record highs for two years in a row.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Standalone hyper scale data centres are a huge waste of cash. All that heat going to waste when it could almost completely be reused as residential or industrial district heating, other industrial processes or in agriculture eg giant greenhouse complexes.
Better yet, combined with other renewable energy into an integrated energy campus.
Tomi Engdahl says:
New Jersey fines data center $1.1M after drone pics expose 62 gas generators
Million-dollar fines won’t end billionaires’ data center pollution, neighbors fear.
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2026/09/new-jersey-fines-data-center-1-1m-after-satellite-pics-expose-62-gas-generators/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=dhfacebook&utm_content=null&fbclid=IwdGRjcAUjsjJleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBwZG9mBXNydGMGYXBwX2lkDDM1MDY4NTUzMTcyOAABHsghTMvrH1OJKn8kDKrt093U54G_Mnfc39YcpNPgMZ7lUeDFD-w65T093SJP_aem_cmdwwIGcSpyiSZ-DzDHB0Q