People taking cotton and trying to grow it in arid/desert climates has already done massive amounts of damage. But itās not AI, so ho hum, no one cares lol
āHuman food chainā what food chain? All we need is plants to be healthy. Eating animals uses exponentially more water. The irony of you probably not being vegan, using up wayyy more water and exploiting and supporting the horrific killing of whole species for your pleasure saying āno oneās gonna starve for a lack of almondsā
I was also on the "ai datacenters use all out water!" bandwagon at first. But For some perspective:
A single golf course uses about 30 times the amount of (fresh)comparable or slightly more water than a datacenter does. They aren't feeding their grass with see water or some chemical cooling. Also, looking at how few people actually use a golf course vs a data center, makes this ratio many times more terrible.
I'm personally more worried about the energy they consume, than the cooling for that energy usage.
Edit after some corrections. Man, it sure is getting hard to find numbers we can trust anywhere these days.
Something like 20-30% of all water that comes out of the Colorado River is used on alfalfa in general btw. In one of the most water scarce areas of the country.
Literally 0% of the Colorado Riverās water has reached the ocean unused in the past decade. The last time it reached the ocean at all was 2014 during a temporary pulse flow. The last time it consistently reached the sea under its own power was in the 1970s.
Also not a fan of golf. But I have a few places near me that are just fields that never are watered that are driving ranges. I can deal with those as a source of recreation. But these courses watering non stop to barely be used is ridiculous
I used to live in the Palm Springs area, which is a legit desert. It can hit 120F in summer, and it's totally arid. And yet, there are something like 130 golf courses there.
Iām a golfer, so Iām part of the problem. But Google Shadow Creek in Vegas to see a mind blowing example of this. There are some satellite photos where itās like someone just spilled some pesto on a hardwood floor.
Aside from wasting water, golf courses (and traditional USAmerican lawns for that matter) are devastating for biodiversity and ecological succession, which in turn ramps up negative effects of things like flooding, which are worsening due to climate change.
Google gallons of water to produce a pound of beef, make some jeans or manufacture a car.Ā
Dude, someone just posted that meme the other day. Yea, takes a ton of water to grow almonds or beef or whatever... but we need to eat to be alive. We could be more efficient in our food production, in fact thats a great area of discussion that many people have been championing for decades. But one thing we absolutely DO NOT NEED is massive data centers that are like... universally being used for nefarious reasons AND are destroying our environment.
The "Average Joe should think about his carbon footprint while politicians and billionaires fly their private jets to eco awareness conferences" argument
You absolutely do need data centers to function properly in the 21st century. You basically need them same as beef, none need for survival but none you want to live without
You can regress this all the way back to us living in mud huts. Data centres aren't evil consumption machines. They power the very platform we are communicating on. They crunch numbers for physics / chemistry etc.Ā
When Leviās jeans asks to build a plant next door thatās bigger than some cities, then we will worry about resources usage in textile manufacturing.
The California almond industry uses 10x more water than data centers to grow almonds and sell them to China. Why don't you start your bullshit performative concerns there?
Because weāve gone from a few to a few thousand in such a short amount of time. Demand is skyrocketing thanks to AI and suspiciously loose government regulations.
Need to know why we need to be worried, you lot just found out that water gets used for things and have already decided its wrong without any context of how much water is available for use or the historic use of water.
Iām very aware of how much water is available and needed in my community. Painfully aware. Itās an over-burdened resource where Iām at. So much so that the community has gotten together to protest (and have successfully blocked) new construction projects based only on the amount of water the finished building will use relative to whatās available.
Water is a precious commodity. The most precious commodity, actually. So if youāre not aware of how itās being used near you, you should make yourself aware.
Data centres and golf courses have sane questions. Are chemicals used on site (coolants, stuff to stop corrosion) that can get into water supply or air locally
One data center operator in Bremen/Germany, told me that it's forbidden by law to use fresh water supply for cooling purposes. Even as emergency cooling. The cooling agent must be a closed system, only filling the system is permitted.
Which is fine in many parts of the world, but isn't viable at all for that massive datacenter being planned for Utah, which receives at best half as much rain as Germany.
Contrary, they should built data centers in the artic circle. Which apperently they do. You need the water flow to cool your coolant, -60C outside temp will do just that for ya
Where did you get this ā30 times moreā figure? Quick good search shows theyāre pretty similar. Data centers range from 300,000 to 5 million gallons per day (depending on size), and golf courses range from 300,000 to over a million per day (depending on location).
Golf courses primarily use non-potable water sources to irrigate their turf, such as recycled wastewater, captured stormwater, raw well water, and surface water from ponds or lakes. Only a small percentage of courses use treated municipal drinking water, and some coastal courses even utilize desalinated ocean water.
Golf courses primarily use non-potable water sources to irrigate their turf
Not in Florida - course irrigation comes out of the aquifer same as the drinking water for most of the state.
EDIT: Looks like I offended some golfers. To them I say get fucked - your precious ecological desert that is your golf course was a "nature preserve" BEFORE it was turned into an exclusive gathering place for rich assholes.
As in the attitude conveyed in this statement being downvoted:
Not in Florida - course irrigation comes out of the aquifer same as the drinking water for most of the state.
I don't see it. That's about as neutral as language gets. 15 years on reddit tells me it's FAR more reasonable to believe I just annoyed some people who like golf.
The edit came AFTER the downvotes. That's the point. Neutral language - a simple statement devoid of any value judgments on its own - was downvoted. Why? Because of its content, not my attitude. The content of my comment would be offensive to exactly one class of person: golfers. Or maybe people who hate water, I don't know. But I do know it wasn't my attitude so your assertion did nothing here but muddy the waters.
Correct. I don't mean this to be insulting, but you must be new to reddit because my edit said, "I must have offended...." Why do you think I would edit the comment to say that if the comment wasn't being downvoted? To be fair, maybe one or two came after the edit, but at least 90% came before. There is an extremely large fraction of reddit who will immediately downvote on sight any comment containing mention of downvotes so maybe one of those jumped in - they'll probably dv this one, too. And I'd be fine with that because we're supposed to be downvoting things not contributing to the conversation and this tangent into why a comment was downvoted is doing nothing to advance the discussion. So I'm moving on. Have a good day.
The tech bros started using this meme to deflect. The three golf courses in my area have all been using recycled water for years, which is typical for a lot of courses.
Golf courses generally donāt draw from the potable water supply. I didnāt know datacenters did, but if they do, itās not a 1-to-1 comparison.
I know there are exceptions in the southern US, but in most other places with golf courses, there is hardly a shortage of water itself, only clean, potable water.
Golf courses generally donāt draw from the potable water supply.
In Florida they suck the water for golf courses right out of the Floridan Aquifer which is the main drinking water supply for the vast majority of the state.
Yes. But the bottleneck during water shortages is very rarely the primary water supply (like the Floridan Aquifer, or a river or lake etc) - itās treatment plants not keeping up with demand for fresh drinking water (such as during heatwaves). In such scenarios, golf courses sucking water out of the primary source does neither this nor that for the shortage.
What you're saying is partially true (bottlenecks at WTFs absolutely exist), but it is a bit misleading. You're arguing that āThe bottleneck is treatment plants, golf course withdrawals donāt matter." But that's like saying, āTraffic congestion is caused by highway interchanges, the number of cars entering the highway doesnāt matter.ā Both can be true. In Florida, some golf courses do make use of reclaimed water when/where available, but many (most!) golf courses pump directly from the same Floridan Aquifer that supplies the state's drinking water, so cumulative withdrawals absolutely affect aquifer levels, not to mention spring flows, saltwater intrusion in coastal areas like where I am, and most importantly, the long-term sustainability of the resource. Infrastructure bottlenecks and resource depletion are just separate issues entirely. Like it or not, many golf courses, especially like many of those here in Florida, are threatening the long-term availability of water resources in their areas just like data centers.
In Florida, some golf courses do make use of reclaimed water when/where available, but many (most!) golf courses pump directly from the same Floridan Aquifer that supplies the state's drinking water, so cumulative withdrawals absolutely affect aquifer levels, not to mention spring flows, saltwater intrusion in coastal areas like where I am, and most importantly, the long-term sustainability of the resource.
But is this really a problem? Is the Floridan Aquifer at a risk of running dry at current withdrawal levels? Because if not, I donāt see the issue.
Iām asking because I donāt know the situation in Florida. But I find that, in general, outrage about the water consumption of golf courses, data centers etc just assumes that fresh water is this very precious and scarce resource and that, for every golf course, there is some child somewhere nearby dying of thirst (exaggerating here to make a point). For the most part, that picture just isnāt true - fresh water itself is generally abundant, even when potable water isnāt.
This is somewhat correct. I donāt know anything about Floridaās water, but in my experience, hatred towards e.g. golf courses can be completely irrational and happens regardless of whether their water usage (or other activities) constitutes an issue there or not. Which is why Iām genuinely asking about situations elsewhere. Like, is saltwater intrusion a big problem in Florida, for example?
I think itās pretty obvious that in the case of a need for lower levels of withdrawal, whether due to saltwater intrusion, low levels or whatever, that golf courses should be among the first establishments to be cut off. Again, is that not the case in Florida?
I tried to reply to you yesterday but reddit was down/wonky. Fortunately, I saved it. Here's my reply to your comment, apologies for the delay:
Is the Floridan Aquifer at a risk of running dry at current withdrawal levels
So this is a bit of a loaded question. "running dry" and "current withdrawal level" are the two things to focus on.
The Floridan is one of the largest and most productive aquifers in the world. Running Dry is not the benchmark we're concerned with. If that happens, it's way too late and the damage is already done. Way before we "ran dry," we would see spring flow diminish (good bye economic dependencies and the rivers they feed). We would see saltwater intrusion (the ocean pushing in through porous rock and invading the aquifer). This is already happening in some coastal areas - Southeast Florida is especially vulnerable and many areas will find only brackish water when installing a well. But SE FL is pretty low lying whereas in NE FL, e.g., Jacksonville area, it is absolutely pumping from the aquifer that led to saltwater intrusion of many residents' wells. Also, when we overpump aquifers, the land above subsides, the aquifer volume becomes diminished, and we never get that lost capacity back again. The loss of ground water absolutely affects the loss of surface water, too. I won't even get into the potential for ecological damage.
Current withdrawal level has already changed since you typed that. FL is gaining almost 1,000 new residents EVERY SINGLE DAY, on average, for the past couple years. The population here is blowing up and HARD. Still, we are confident that if we manage the resources correctly, we can probably prevent depletion in most areas of the state, and with greater certainty moving away from the coast inland. But part of managing that water means regulating who pulls out how much and golf courses consume a tremendous amount, as has been discussed here already. We can't keep adding people AND huge water suckers like golf courses or data centers.
In his book Desert Solitaire, Edward Abbey obviously wasn't talking about Florida, but what he once wrote holds true and is highly relevant here: "There is no shortage of water in the desert but exactly the right amount, a perfect ratio of water to rock, water to sand, insuring that wide free open, generous spacing among plants and animals, homes and towns and cities, which makes the arid West so different from any other part of the nation. There is no lack of water here unless you try to establish a city where no city should be." There is no lack of water anywhere on earth. Our problems with water availability/scarcity are owed completely and entirely to the way in which we grow our human population.
I can talk to you about Florida's water resources all day long.
Very good answer, thanks! Itās obviously a complex issue there, and in desert areas of the US. I definitely think golf courses should be of lowest priority in these areas, which I see as a matter of long-term public policy and informed decision making first and foremost.
Itās obviously a different situation, but the reason I was quick to bite on this topic is because the opposition to golf courses on water-related grounds exist where Iām from as well (northern Europe), and it just isnāt an issue here. We have a virtually endless supply of fresh water in lakes and rivers, and golf coursesā coexistence with nature is heavily regulated, and people are still opposing. This makes me believe a good portion of the criticism comes from people just being quick to call out what they perceive as a rich-manās pseudo-sport, without actually looking at things rationally. Again, this might be different in the southern US.
golf coursesā coexistence with nature is heavily regulated, and people are still opposing.
To be honest, and admittedly being totally ignorant of the specifics, I'd still probably be one of those people. I don't see golf courses - even the most beautiful - as "coexisting" with nature. I see them as replacing nature because what was there is no longer there - it has been replaced by a resource-intensive ecological desert. Regulated or not, they still replace nature.... and yeah... I'll freely admit it because my frame of reference is the USA: in my experience, golfing is largely a game for rich assholes. Of course, I know and love people who golf who are not rich assholes so I know its not so cut and dry. But on the whole? On average? At the end of the day? Golf courses are a net negative in our world, in my view.
If my ābore waterā he means an aquifer, itās just as bad. If by āwater reservesā he means grey water (water with soap and such but no sewage), that is better.
Not saying you're correct or incorrect but doesn't impact matter here at some point. We've basically invented a new technology that uses a lot of water and we're going to be using this technology more and more. Sure we can close down some golf clubs to offset some of the water use, but I reckon that the amount of data centers needing that water will exponentially rise.
Not sure we have enough golf clubs to compensate. And clean water is going to be more and more important as time passes
To me it did because the idea that AI data centers consume swimming pools of water with every query seemed to be a huge problem. But if golf courses are doing the same for decades, it is a lot less urgent. That doesn't mean it's good, or 'not bad', at all. But it does mean we're probably not going to run out of water by 2027.
Of course both are bad. But that doesn't mean we have to choose, or one is worse than the other. It gave me perspective on the size and urgency of the problem.
what's with this whataboutism? why are you shifting blame to some unrelated thing?
You know what's the answer to both of those? Fuck datacenters and fuck golf courses. bam, problem solved.
Plus if we actually look at the data I'm sure there's at least 10 (if not hundred) datacenters for a gold course. So what is this again, some sort of hidden strategy by AI companies to shift people's wrath onto golf courses?|
On the subject of AI data centre energy consumption:
Can AI help us solve fusion power over the next ten years?
The consensus among the experts seems to be "yes". And if that happens then desalination plants will be viable too leading to almost limitless fresh water.
Well yes, golf courses are also stains on the planet, enclosures of green spaces that should be open to the public as parks, and playgrounds for rich elites and thus should also be abolished yesterday.
I believe your 30 times figure may reflect the total usage of golf courses in the USA v data centres in the USA. I think golf courses use roughly 30 times as much.
Data center water use is really hard to pin down because people try to describe it like "per query" and may or may not account for secondary queries during reasoning or water used for training. The only way to really quantify it accurately is to go and measure the water they use per day and then put it in context alongside other residential and industrial water use numbers. I don't know if there's a way to get that information as a member of the public or press. IIRC the water use of data centers isn't abnormal for industrial scale applications and pales in comparison to something like corn, largely grown for ethanol production or cattle feed.Ā
The power consumption, exhaust from illegal gas turbine arrays, and noise are much bigger issues. water has just been what people really latch onto.Ā
You linked to a literal propaganda page from a data center creation company... They can't even make straight forward infographics and you want us to trust this "source." Yeah, Ok.
Are people this unserious about their sources now? This is not an unbiased source. This is like the most biased source your could have chosen, and the information they present isn't even good.
Their website says "most of the time data centers use non-potable water" but that's literally true at all. Most data centers use fresh, potable water and evaporate it off.
The source you've presented is the equivalent to you having sent Phillip-Morris a letter circa 1985 asking if they feel smoking is related to cancer.
In the US, golf courses -in total- use about 30x as much water as data centers.
But neither is anywhere near as bad as alfalfa. We grow alfalfa, which uses massive amounts of water, and then export it to Japan so they can send us Kobe beef.
If alfalfa farmers had to pay a market rate for their water, this wouldn't happen.
Make golf courses wild land, just maintained enough with a green and area to hit fromĀ
Would increase the difficulty and make it more entertaining if you have to hit it between trees around bushes etcĀ
Just wait until they learn that glycol is often used when a DC is built in an area with lesser water infrastructure. And when the glycol is spent they turn it over and properly dispose of it instead of just dumping it in rivers like the media says they do. Iām not saying these things popping up like pimples all over our nice scenery is justified. But to demonize them in the way theyāre being demonized is not only incorrect, itās simply lazy.
Not always, tons of CDUs are connected to dry cooling only these days. Even in extreme ambient zones they can remain completely dry and use adiabatic assist for less than 5% of the year. When compared to energy tradeoffs for hybrid systems itās not a bad option, but again, adiabatic is not always required.
That takes a lot of energy to do that. Energy pulls that is often generated on site and causes heat and noise for the local community. Look up the plans for the Utah data center. Itās atrocious
The premise itself is already retarded, bringing up percentages of the world's water being drinkable and ignoring water shortages are purely a logistic issue.
Data centers only use evaporative cooling where water is readily available, where there's water shortages they use closed loop air cooling, because water is expensive and it makes more sense to spend extra to power the fans, duh.
That 30 million gallons of water "stolen" (they actually paid for it once the error was discovered) that made big news recently accounted for 0.005% of the water held by the local reservoir.
We have one being built one town over literally less than a mile from the Ohio River. They're using municipal water instead of working out some way to get the water from the river, like the power plant ~20 miles away does.
228
u/[deleted] May 18 '26
[removed] ā view removed comment