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New gas-powered data centers could emit more greenhouse gases than whole nations

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Re: New gas-powered data centers could emit more greenhouse gases than whole nations

#131

Post by foxyv »

aresant wrote: post #9

The AI data center narrative is the perfect storm: First most of the data center build out is happening in areas that have had little other opportunity so local resistance is muted. Abilene, Texas is referenced and is the kind of place my grandfather would lovingly say is where you go to learn to be a “dirt farmer” Second, every environmentalist in the US is fighting 100 different battles with the most anti-regulatio…

Abilene is the confluence of three major resources. Massive wind farms that stretch from horizon to horizon, natural gas wells that are constantly having to flare off excess capacity, and a direct freeway connection to both Fort Worth and Dallas. In addition, land is dirt cheap.

I suspect their biggest problem will be water availability so they will need to use some other method for cooling.

Re: New gas-powered data centers could emit more greenhouse gases than whole nations

#132

Post by tren_hard »

foxyv wrote: post #131
aresant wrote: post #9

The AI data center narrative is the perfect storm: First most of the data center build out is happening in areas that have had little other opportunity so local resistance is muted. Abilene, Texas is referenced and is the kind of place my grandfather would lovingly say is where you go to learn to be a “dirt farmer” Second, every environmentalist in the US is fighting 100 different battles with the most anti-regulatio…

Abilene is the confluence of three major resources. Massive wind farms that stretch from horizon to horizon, natural gas wells that are constantly having to flare off excess capacity, and a direct freeway connection to both Fort Worth and Dallas. In addition, land is dirt cheap. I suspect their biggest problem will be water availability so they will need to use some other method for cooling.

Maybe they can use the abundant oil for cooling as well :) that is how transformers are cooled

Re: New gas-powered data centers could emit more greenhouse gases than whole nations

#133

Post by triceratops »

melling wrote: post #17
aresant wrote: post #9

The AI data center narrative is the perfect storm: First most of the data center build out is happening in areas that have had little other opportunity so local resistance is muted. Abilene, Texas is referenced and is the kind of place my grandfather would lovingly say is where you go to learn to be a “dirt farmer” Second, every environmentalist in the US is fighting 100 different battles with the most anti-regulatio…

Don’t forget environmentalists have been fighting against nuclear energy for decades. Update: Since I’m being downvoted I’m going to add a little sting: Good luck with your solar power web servers and skipping flights. Poor judgement really does have a price. It’s now inevitable that it’s going to get a bit warmer… everywhere. We’ll be lucky to hit Net Zero by 2100.

"Environmentalists" have been fighting against many things for decades: eating meat, deforestation, whaling, air travel, mining, automobiles, fur.

Assuming it was really environmentalists who did it, why is nuclear energy the only thing they succeeded at stopping?

Re: New gas-powered data centers could emit more greenhouse gases than whole nations

#134

Post by throwaway-11-1 »

red75prime wrote: post #87
konschubert wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Abilene, Texas is also a great place to build a solar power plant with some batteries and reduce the gas bills for these datacenters. EDIT: I am not suggesting that they don’t build gas turbines or go off grid. I’m saying they can save fuel by using solar when it’s there.

Some batteries? Battery-backed solar has the highest cost as a baseload power source due to high intermittency of solar power.

good point, I guess the market says we have to poison the earth

Re: New gas-powered data centers could emit more greenhouse gases than whole nations

#135

Post by foxyv »

tren_hard wrote: post #132
foxyv wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Abilene is the confluence of three major resources. Massive wind farms that stretch from horizon to horizon, natural gas wells that are constantly having to flare off excess capacity, and a direct freeway connection to both Fort Worth and Dallas. In addition, land is dirt cheap. I suspect their biggest problem will be water availability so they will need to use some other method for cooling.

Maybe they can use the abundant oil for cooling as well :) that is how transformers are cooled

I was thinking heat pumps hooked up to radiators and/or geo grids. Right now the cheapest method is evaporators which use a ton of water. It's expensive to get rid of a couple megawatts like that. Some data centers have their own microclimates that are 10-20C hotter on average.

Re: New gas-powered data centers could emit more greenhouse gases than whole nations

#136

Post by Sabinus »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #49
gruez wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Because it’s a dangerous technology where profit over security can have severe consequences. Yeah it's far better to have power plants kill a steady stream of people, but in a banal way that's hard to attribute, like coal power plants causing lung cancer.

No, but hydroelectric works pretty well. There's a reason they recycle aluminum, etc. (power-hungry industries—crypto-mining, ha ha) along the Columbia River, etc. So build your data centers there. No reason to choose the least evil.

The Green movement in Australia was started over the successful blocking of a hydroelectric dam. Rivers are usually highly ecologically significant.

Re: New gas-powered data centers could emit more greenhouse gases than whole nations

#137

Post by red75prime »

throwaway-11-1 wrote: post #134
red75prime wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some batteries? Battery-backed solar has the highest cost as a baseload power source due to high intermittency of solar power.

good point, I guess the market says we have to poison the earth

No, it means that if you expect that sticking solar panels everywhere will solve all the problems for cheap (because solar panels are cheap), then you are up for a disappointment. I am of the opinion that handling out rose-tinted glasses will not go well.

Re: New gas-powered data centers could emit more greenhouse gases than whole nations

#138

Post by atonse »

anticorporate wrote: post #108
atonse wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it’s hardly industrialized right? So is that a fair comparison?

It actually sits right about in the middle of all countries for percentage of GDP from industrial sectors. It's pretty heavily fossil-fuel powered right now, but like most of the rest of the world Morocco is planning to capture most of its growth in energy demand with renewables. Because, getting back to the original discussion, it'd be idiotic to choose fossil fuels over renewables in 2026.

100% agree with you. Especially with the amount of sun they get, would be a great candidate for Solar.

Renewables also seem to be the best pathway for many nations to attain some level of energy independence (which is NOT the same as oil independence though).

Re: New gas-powered data centers could emit more greenhouse gases than whole nations

#139

Post by atonse »

cyanydeez wrote: post #61
atonse wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it’s hardly industrialized right? So is that a fair comparison?

Are you, like, just not very into reading things or remembering things or is it just one of those things where you're stuck in the 1980s and haven't updated your books since then. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Morocco

Yeah, clearly I haven't done any meaningful reading regarding Morocco. I will read up more to fix the gaps in my knowledge. :-)

Re: New gas-powered data centers could emit more greenhouse gases than whole nations

#140

Post by throwaway173738 »

applied_heat wrote: post #106
JKCalhoun wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, but hydroelectric works pretty well. There's a reason they recycle aluminum, etc. (power-hungry industries—crypto-mining, ha ha) along the Columbia River, etc. So build your data centers there. No reason to choose the least evil.

Hydro electric as a resource is probably mostly exploited - are there a lot of big hydro projects left to build? If there are they must be difficult or expensive or they would have already been built.

In the Cascades they’re deconstructing dams as the benefits were oversold while the maintenance costs and environmental impacts were underestimated.
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