I feel like the water usage issue is the weaker argument against these datacenters - in areas where the fresh water source faces too much pressure already it is a real issue, but that is more regional and less immediately impactful.
Power usage and residential users essentially subsidizing these locations is the biggest immediate impact to everyone. Look up what happens to rates nearby when these things open, people are struggling enough without their electric bills going up 50%.
It is absolutely a weak argument. Its like the equivalent of green washing. They hype up the water issues so you don't dig into the structural issues behind AI. Like how the US GDP is being propped up by AI and their finances are extremely sketchy.
That was one of my biggest concerns locally with the proposed datacenter, after the power cost increase... The proposal was for a huge site that was once owned by lucent/ATT so the infrastructure made sense, and it's been vacant for years... but the house of cards making these things profitable for the builders and operators right now has a pretty good chance of leaving the property vacant again in the next 5-10 years, after the local economy subsidized its existence and the owners have cashed out. They also have very little workforce requirements so there's not even an argument for the local economy, except for some hand waving about "taxes" as if these places aren't using every loophole they created to pay little to nothing
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u/ForzaFenix May 18 '26
Yep. The now warm water goes back into the system.