In America data centers have been bombed before, I worry they will be bombed again.
posted on in: Notable Articles, tech, ai, climate and political violence.
~2,002 words, about a 11 min read.
I can't help but think we've been extremely lucky that no real violence has hit stuff like data centers up to this point. I read this and I suspect it is inevitable that someone will attack one of these as they start to make survival of the community vs a massive data center a zero sum affair.
“By 2035, data centers globally are projected to use about as much electricity as India…according to the International Energy Agency. A single data center can also use more than 500,000 gallons of water a day, nearly as much as an Olympic-size swimming pool.”
It's been long held off, but I can't help but think it's just a matter of time before that bottle gets uncorked and then all bets are off as to when it stops. As international and local government appeals to regulate and protester action becomes less effective some people will start to believe they have no choice.
Added this link to my context page section specifically on AI + Water Use
A remainder that the way things are need not work this specific way, even to achieve similar technological outcomes!
It's so exciting to see somebody looking at machine learning model creation holistically and seeking to rebuild it from the ground up.
"Technological development" does not need to look the way it does. Other things are possible!!
Some following conversations:
I'm genuinely surprised we have not seen more drone based domestic terrorism
Malm talks about this starting to happen in the Middle East in his "How to Blow Up A Pipeline" & I'm convinced it is b/c almost every Imperial Core security agency realized this possibility immediately & has heavily regulated & monitored drone use, locking off the possibility before it could really be affordable.
I've never seen a clear rundown on this but drone regulations are pervasive everywhere in the US. I wouldn't be surprised if there's more area of America where you can't fly drones than there is where you can't open carry.
if you look at the effectiveness in Ukraine it's very very difficult to stop, as they're easy to hide and hard to detect at low altitude
Yup. And existing security approaches just don't have the right structure to stop it. I wonder how many data centers have also secured no fly zones around themselves. I would bet at least a few
This person has been crusading with data (including in the comments of that Mexico piece, which he talks about in a separate post). I need to find a cogent counterargument if you have seen any.
His data is suspect, badly sourced and stripped of context. His citations are mostly circular to his own overly long posts. I don't find his work convincing. Or worth arguing with directly. It has the mein of a Something Awful post: even where accurate, intellectually dishonest.
On the other hand I maintain a list of sources, all from reliable publications and/or with clear citations and data. These have assumed trustworthiness and must be disproven. He does not have that assumption and his attempts to disprove the water-use talking points lack rigor or holistic data.
Here's my counter argument: Do data centers have an environmental impact? Yes, in water, in energy, in e-waste. Arguing about the scale of that impact is fundamentally missing the point because it is an impact that would not be there at any scale if not for the extensive AI use.
That impact is negative and the argument about the size of it is fundamentally irrelevant. An impact exists, it's socially relevant. Is it providing a good? Something of value to the community around it and online? What is the alternative with lower impact? These are questions worth asking.
Substack guy here is making a business of providing a salve to tech people who don't want to feel bad about their toys having an impact. If that's a concern for the reader then his arguments are fundamentally irrelevant. If it isn't then no amount of sources will convince someone to give a fuck.
Since this is the 3rd time someone has linked this work to me I'll say a standard response on his 'data'. I've no interest in a guy whose responses is 'Bloomberg/any MSM outlet has journalists, data people, fact checkers, editors and lawyers but I googled some and decided they're wrong'.
Mainstream media are not always right or without slant but the burden of disproving them is a lot higher then this work & I've little interest in engaging with work that thinks so little about the process of building a shared truth. This is the work of someone who is interested only in undermining the knowledge of the situation.
There's an overwhelming amount of well-reported work about environmental impact of AI and the counter I've seen thus far is a bunch of randoms who go 'don't you know how much water paper or a burger takes to make' which is an unserious troll argument. That makes it clear to me where the truth leans.
This particular person certainly has a bunch of … not attractive associations… which is why I am loathe to share him wide and far. So thanks for the response.
I am uncomfortable with this kind of argument because of how it turns into whataboutism, and can end up in the “what is the point of art? It is not even productive!” Kinda arguments.
I read his stuff. It's pure whataboutism. We live on a burning planet. It's time to really question if we are allocating resources correctly and in service of our goals and the human spirit. A data center training AI to more accurately rip off artists does neither.
Especially when there are real alternatives. The assumptions of how AI systems work now stem from centralized monopolistic hierarchical approaches for all-in-one systems. We need not accept any of those assumptions. None of this has to happen, much less the way it currently is.
There have been people who've tried but I guess it might not make it to the news as data center operators have no interest in highlighting these attempts. The security is pretty tight around data centers for a reason (and it's opaque who's using them for what by design)
Been thinking about this a lot lately. Heck, just reading about these data centers makes me want to take a Molotov cocktail to them ... i can't imagine what it's like living where they're being built, with all the fallout from construction, energy use, pollution, etc.
Exactly, water use is really only a small part of it.
How much of the water issue do you think is real? Feels like media is not doing a good job explaining or nuance.
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There's a lot of plausible deniability which this article is eating up here.
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The point is that any amount of water used for something perceived as bad, especially if it is seen as responsible for job loss, will be seen as very bad.
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There are a lot of reliable studies by experts towards excessive water use.
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As the OP notes, the impact is equally on taking up huge amounts of space and straining the grid, which is indisputable. Think how this compares with oil pipelines as a climate, cultural, and indigenous concern.
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Data centers are being built that would not have been built if not for generative AI training and use needs. Can't argue with that impact.
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The people building the data centers are being intentionally quite secretive, which is a bad look. It also makes it hard for media coverage which must rely on real sources with traceable numbers to make anything but the negative case and begs the question 'why be so secretive?'.
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Finally the case that AI and data centers are having a big negative impact is being made by studies & reporting and people on the ground. The opposed case is made in long Medium articles, random threads, and by un-credentialed Substackers. It is not an even pair-up on the trustworthy metrics.
It would be nice as tech people to not feel bad about dozens of sq miles of our infrastructure having real environmental impacts, but I don't think there's grounds to ignore it, even if we talked about e-waste alone. We have to push for more sustainable community-integrated models for our systems.
The alternative, the version where we pretend all the impact is being lied about or mistaken, is to see data centers treated like oil pipelines. We're on our way there and that future is much worse then stepping back now and finding lower impact options.
Thank you for the long response!
I’m annoyed at the lack of education everywhere.
Recent CBC article talked about 435ml of water used … for the generation of electricity (we have hydro power here! It’s not “used up”)
The secrecy & claims of good jobs is bad.
Yes to this!
This recent Charles Stross post talks through solar + geopolitical impact.
As an aside he kind of points to local AI / edge devices, which I very much hope happens and am researching.
This is my hope as well, an internet composed of more mesh, close to the Edge, community server farms, etc... & more renewables (even Canada isn't all the way!) There's a future w/a sustainable internet, but we have to hold the powers-that-be to that future.
Also, W3C did some extensive work to think through options for a more sustainable web.
Iirc, Google dropped it's carbon neutral promise once the genAI/LLM race started heating up. They've said they're still aiming for it in press releases, but it was removed from their website.
Article highlights
“Those are happy problems,” said Mr. Sterling, the director of industrial development for Querétaro, where many of Mexico’s 110 data centers are. “Not for the people that suffer it, but for the development of the place.”
It is a refrain echoed, if often less bluntly, by officials elsewhere as they woo tech companies. Brazil is creating new tax breaks. Malaysia carved out an industrial zone to attract Chinese and Silicon Valley firms. The United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia ran a diplomatic campaign to get support from President Trump to buy prized A.I. chips that companies need. The European Union has vowed to spend billions on new regional data centers.
[...]
Impoverished small towns in the area, which have struggled with basic services, began experiencing longer water shortages and more blackouts, according to more than a dozen residents.
“There are patients with kidney failure who need their machines for treatment,” said Manuel Rodríguez, a local government representative. “There are people with diabetes who need to keep their medication refrigerated.”
Mexico’s national power company attributed recent outages to lightning strikes and stray animals running into equipment.
Residents have been hit financially by the power and water disruptions. In Viborillas, a town near the data centers, Elizabeth Sánchez and her neighbors began experiencing water outages in June 2024. They now split a $60 fee for private water trucks.
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— Via Paul Mozur, Adam Satariano and Emiliano Rodríguez Mega, From Mexico to Ireland, Fury Mounts Over a Global A.I. Frenzy