Data centres seem unattainable...

[t2van]

I saw this article yesterday in my feed:

Writing a single 100-word email with ChatGPT consumes approximately the volume of a standard bottle of water, the global infrastructure processing AI queries is projected to use the equivalent of half the United Kingdom's annual water withdrawal by 2

The figure for a single email comes from a 2025 peer-reviewed paper in Communications of the ACM by Pengfei Li, Shaolei Ren, and colleagues at the University of California, Riverside. The paper, titled “Making AI Less Thirsty,” sets out the methodology by which the per-query water footprint of...

spacedaily.com

Writing a single 100-word email with ChatGPT consumes approximately the volume of a standard bottle of water, the global infrastructure processing AI queries is projected to use the equivalent of half the United Kingdom's annual water withdrawal by 2027, and much of that water is being drawn from regions already experiencing severe drought.​

Given they constantly use fresh water to cool everything and never seem to recycle it or try to cool down the hot water and re use.

Surely the push, demand and development of more and more AI centres will become our own undoing?

I'm not sure if Michael Burry had this in mind when he was saying water would become the next market thing (the guy who predicted the market / housing crash)

Thoughts?

 

[SilverClouds]

That's really, really not sustainable

We need more local models, etc, not this. Especially since AI companies themselves can't pay for electricity costs and push costs on neighbours instead. Now extreme water usage as well. Just wow. I get that technology is interesting and useful but they need to fix that.

 

[Spiderman]

I think this is going to cause a lot of environmental impacts too.

They’re going to need to get even more water for these so who’s to say they won’t start draining lakes next? I know they need to purify the water but they have to get the water from somewhere first.

 

[Dopious]

Closed loop system in the Artics would be nice.

 

[Octavia]

Closed loop system in the Artics would be nice.

Perhaps, or doing it 100 meters under the sea, but power becomes a problem I suppose.

Who lives in a data center under the sea...?

 

[Dopious]

Perhaps, or doing it 100 meters under the sea, but power becomes a problem I suppose.

I don`t think power would be a problem, there are power cables from wind turbines in the North sea, if they can do it this can be done too.

Who lives in a data center under the sea...?

A couple of weeks in silense might really be nice though.

 

[2122Jumpstreet]

With as much as I look into AI this is one area my knowledge is lacking in.

But really what's stopping them from building these data centers in some cold place? I know latency is one problem but there is cold inhabited places they can use. Canada?

 

[SilverClouds]

Closed loop system in the Artics would be nice.

Perhaps, or doing it 100 meters under the sea, but power becomes a problem I suppose.

Who lives in a data center under the sea...?

So creative

A couple of weeks in silense might really be nice though.

Sounds tempting eh

But really what's stopping them from building these data centers in some cold place? I know latency is one problem but there is cold inhabited places they can use. Canada?

They're already adding their power costs to americans' electricity bills, I don't think canadians would appreciate the same happening to them

 

[Zwielicht]

They're already adding their power costs to americans' electricity bills, I don't think canadians would appreciate the same happening to them

I can attest to this one. My electric company seriously sent me this flyer back in January happily announcing they raised prices because of the new data centre.

Many on Nextdoor are upset about this. A few years ago, the rate was around $0.11/kwh. Starting in January of this year they raised it to $0.20/kwh and right now it’s $0.2230/kwh alongside a bunch of new “mandatory fees”.

In a year and a half they’ve more than doubled the prices. What should be a $150 electric bill for me is now about it $350/month because of the price increase and new fees.

On top of that, they’ve announced that they're going to continue doing prices increases into 2027. I bet they’re going to x10 the electric bill this time next year.

Mandatory @UnusualSubstance tag because DBS.​

If they think this is sustainable then they’ve lost their minds.

 

[Dopious]

 

[TheVigilante]

So what's the workaround?

Greta Thunberg to the rescue?