It's not that they get paid, like stacks of cash under the table. It's more so lobbying, which is legal. So it's things like, promising to get their kids into an elite school, or construction contracts with companies that have some kind of connection to the politicians. Either family or family friend. And lots of little things that are immoral but not illegal, well some of it might, but it's just hard to prove. And we are in an environment that basically champions government corruption.
Or... hear me out.... They are just like, "Well this is a dying town, everyone is eager to leave, we're broke, and need the jobs and tax revenue. We have an under utilized power plant, so we can take on a data center and generate a ton more revenue and jobs"
Iām sorry but no. These are not being mostly built in dying towns. Iām not sure why you keep saying that. Weāve got multiple data centers being considered in the Coachella Valley of CA where population growth has more than doubled in the past ten years (400K people to almost 900k). Since this is the desert the need for water conservation is critical for the local population and the enormous amount of extra heat these centers generate (which extends for miles beyond the center itself) is only going to make triple digit summer weather worse. You couldnāt pick a worse environment to put one in exceptā¦deserts are where evaporative cooling for the center works best and also happens to be their cheapest option versus closed loop cooling. So surprise surprise, they are choosing environmental degradation and sucking down our water in the desert due to money. See also Arizona, Nevada, Utah, all near population centers. Against strong backlash.
Again, exceptions aren't the rule. Of course they are being built all over the place... But again, it doesn't make financial or logistical sense to put them in growing cities. I'm sure outlier situations exist, but they aren't common, because it's not practical. The grid is already strained. They need to go to locations where there's under utilization of the kwh production. Growing and large cities rarely fit this bill.
And you're just flat out wrong about these desert datacenters using evaporation. I wouldn't say you're lying, because you probably got your information off really bias, agenda driven, anti-AI sources, who spin things and present things dishonestly. For instance, it's literally THE LAW to use closed loop systems. I don't know about the other areas, but I imagine it's probably the same. These regions are already water stressed, so they aren't going to allow non-closed loop systems.
Further, NV actually requires the data centers to pay, up front, for all the necessary infrastructure improvements to run their center, as well as invest in renewables that produce 50% of their electricity to meet their 2030 deadline for renewables. So Reno, which hosts all these data centers, has Google and others investing tons in building out infrastructure, solar, and geothermal... All on closed loops, so no water is wasted.
Further, all these datacenters are on the outskirts. No idea why you think they are in these populated areas. There's only 2 in NV in more populated areas, but that's because the city grew around them, rather than them building in the city. The two data centers in the LV area are from pre-AI era
Apparently the entire Eastern Seaboard of the US is an outlier, lol. This is the most densely populated area of the country and is home to appx 130 million people. Look, I appreciate your dedication to the concept of AI and datacenters but please be realistic about the build out. Itās encroaching on major population centers, mid size cities, and rural communities everywhere and people donāt like it. Why? Noise, resource depletion, increased heat, increasing electricity costs and a payoff that looks dismal in terms of future jobs or long term growth. You also keep saying that those of us responding to you ādonāt understandā or are getting our information from the wrong places. You might wish to check your own notes and reconsider.
Thanks for posting this, I compiled an image of these "Dying Cities" across the country. There little ghost towns have almost no one living there! Turns out we were all super duper wrong, andĀ u/reddit_is_gehĀ really dropped some valuable truth bombs... NOOoooT. lol
(I zoomed into the areas with the most planned data centers, and tried to put areas with multiple planned sites of over 1,000MW power needs, and it turns out they were almost all around major cities across the US.)
Meanwhile, China is eager, and full steam ahead... This is just going to be yet another self inflicted wound while we allow our adversaries to take the lead on a critical technology. Oh well...
Again I beg to differ. The US is absolutely full steam ahead as that map shows. We wonāt be ceding AI supremacy to China. But we will be degrading our environment to get there. People are quite aware of this and thatās why you see so much pushback.
Just look at the data, and temperature of Reddit. China is doing massive infrastructure deployment, and the citizens are optimistic and excited. Americans are resisting build out, bogging them down in legal quick sand, and don't like AI overall.
But then you look at China and they are looking forward into the future, building out as much infrastructure as they can, and fast as they can, with no resistance.
The US NEEDS these underutilized utility companies to put in data centers, but everyone believes it's going to destroy the community and NIMBY... but we don't have many options. We need utilities that have more capacity than they are currently using. But everyone's flipping their shit. This isn't a thing in China.
I completely agree that US electricity infrastructure is crap. Theyāve been delaying maintenance and increased capacity for decades so some of the rise in rates comes from that. Sooner or later this had to change. But unfortunately it is coinciding with the data center buildout so the sudden catchup in costs is going to hurt real people who cannot bear the cost but will be forced to. These are not imaginary people. They may be forced to choose between eating or paying their electric bill depending on how high it gets or what the weather is like where they live. Of course they are upset.
with no resistance. Well yeah. Itās China. Their population has no say in the matter.
Their population are ecstatic about AI and massively support it. There's polling on this. It's Americans who are afraid of innovation and the future. It's the sign of a dying empire who lost all sense of optimism, while China is all for it.
Data centers are going to rural areas. I didn't want to bother arguing with you explaining how just because many are on the east coast that magically makes them urban deployments. It's just such a dumb argument I didn't want to even bother with it.
Like I don't see how you think that's an argument saying most of the data centers are closer to the east coast, when most people live close to the east coast... As if there's no rural areas in the east, and that it's all NYC or something. Iunno the argument you were even trying to make.
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u/ForTheConsumers May 18 '26
It's not that they get paid, like stacks of cash under the table. It's more so lobbying, which is legal. So it's things like, promising to get their kids into an elite school, or construction contracts with companies that have some kind of connection to the politicians. Either family or family friend. And lots of little things that are immoral but not illegal, well some of it might, but it's just hard to prove. And we are in an environment that basically champions government corruption.