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Field measurements of neighborhood-scale air temperature impacts of data centers

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Re: Field measurements of neighborhood-scale air temperature impacts of data centers

#171

Post by tracerbulletx »

dwoldrich wrote: post #35

I cannot figure out if this data center panic is legit or trumped up. There are legitimate nation-state and political entities that would love to create pressure for degrowth in this area. And, pollution and natural resources are a concern, yes, fine, sure. NIMBY happens, I get it ... *BUT*, we've been building huge data centers for decades and they are minuscule compared to the size of the earth. My skeptic meter ma…

Me not being able to buy memory or gpus is enough for me to be pissed off about it. Reversal of Personal Computing back towards centralized computing is bad and I am not happy about it.

I also am not happy about the privacy and surveillance state capabilities. How much you care about these things might be subjective, but they are definitely real effects that are happening that are not a panic.

Re: Field measurements of neighborhood-scale air temperature impacts of data centers

#172

Post by [deleted] »

WarmWash wrote: post #137
sjoedev wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We’re building data centers in the U.S. at an unprecedented and increasing rate [1]. Is it so hard to imagine that something which was fine at one scale may begin to cause issues at some massively higher scale? If I drink one glass of wine per day, it’s probably fine. If I drink three bottles per day, I’m gonna start having problems. [1] https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/monthly-spending-data-cen...

Yeah, but when we account for that scale, and look at resource usage, datacenters aren't topping the charts, or even really getting in the top 5, for anything. You have people who eat meat at every meal losing their mind over water usage and people who set their AC to 68 panicking over energy usage.

[deleted]

Re: Field measurements of neighborhood-scale air temperature impacts of data centers

#173

Post by Groxx »

duplessitous wrote: post #164
Groxx wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By then it is too late, plus they never pay enough in damages. And the EPA does not have teeth currently, and damage will be done while fixing that too. So people fight by pattern recognition: abnormally incentivized and extremely large? Kill it with fire immediately . It's mostly reasonable and more effective than anything else at the moment.

Right, but misinformation is ineffective as it forces the conversation to revolve around the misinformation and not the topic we were attempting to discuss. If we need an example, we need look no further than this thread Beyond this, it is my opinion that people are cowards. The few who care about this issue enough to perform terroristic actions won't spur any sort of meaningful change in the general population becau…

Honestly, anything that gets people paying attention to stuff that has been building for decades is good in my book.

I agree that'll be a much better end-state to be in, but is it the best right now? ... idk. We're in an increasingly blatant "smash and grab" phase for major corporations right now, and they need to be stopped quickly.

Re: Field measurements of neighborhood-scale air temperature impacts of data centers

#174

Post by tzs »

api wrote: post #62
dwoldrich wrote: post #35

I cannot figure out if this data center panic is legit or trumped up. There are legitimate nation-state and political entities that would love to create pressure for degrowth in this area. And, pollution and natural resources are a concern, yes, fine, sure. NIMBY happens, I get it ... *BUT*, we've been building huge data centers for decades and they are minuscule compared to the size of the earth. My skeptic meter ma…

I've done a bit of research into it, and I think it's a mix. The energy thing is exaggerated. Want to compensate for a week of heavy AI coding usage? If you drive to work, telecommute for one day. Skip one long-distance DoorDash order. Cars use tons of energy, a lot more per-user than the fraction of data center capacity you're using with your AI stuff. A burrito on DoorDash delivered using an average MPG gas car use…

> The energy thing is exaggerated. Want to compensate for a week of heavy AI coding usage? If you drive to work, telecommute for one day. Skip one long-distance DoorDash order. Cars use tons of energy, a lot more per-user than the fraction of data center capacity you're using with your AI stuff. A burrito on DoorDash delivered using an average MPG gas car uses something like a week's worth of heavy AI usage in energy.

It doesn't work like that because skipping your DoorDash burrito doesn't make the energy not used for that available for data center use.

The AI data center energy problem is that they use an order of magnitude more than regular data centers and they are being built at a massively higher rate than regular data centers and they are being built in places where many are being built and their owners are in a hurry.

The electric grid is designed to handle growth in demand, but this is growth way beyond anything that was anticipated.

Re: Field measurements of neighborhood-scale air temperature impacts of data centers

#175

Post by jstummbillig »

sjoedev wrote: post #65
dwoldrich wrote: post #35

I cannot figure out if this data center panic is legit or trumped up. There are legitimate nation-state and political entities that would love to create pressure for degrowth in this area. And, pollution and natural resources are a concern, yes, fine, sure. NIMBY happens, I get it ... *BUT*, we've been building huge data centers for decades and they are minuscule compared to the size of the earth. My skeptic meter ma…

We’re building data centers in the U.S. at an unprecedented and increasing rate [1]. Is it so hard to imagine that something which was fine at one scale may begin to cause issues at some massively higher scale? If I drink one glass of wine per day, it’s probably fine. If I drink three bottles per day, I’m gonna start having problems. [1] https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/monthly-spending-data-cen...

Oh, it's absolutely easy to imagine. That is what should give us pause. We are fantastic at imagining things. We are less fantastic at being reasonable.

Re: Field measurements of neighborhood-scale air temperature impacts of data centers

#176

Post by jayGlow »

qarl2 wrote: post #118
drfloyd51 wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait… large customers move in and your rate goes up? Forget about it. These AI companies could really help themselves by subsidizing local rates. Imagine if a large AI datacenter moved in AND your rate dropped by $70! Everyone would be singing their praises.

Oregon just passed a law saying data centers will pay more for electricity than normal people, and the math says that everyone's rates will be going down. So, again, I think it depends on whether you live in a red or blue state. https://www.opb.org/article/2026/06/04/data-centers-utility-...

that seems odd, do other industries pay a higher rate for electricity or is this specifically targeting data centers?

Re: Field measurements of neighborhood-scale air temperature impacts of data centers

#177

Post by colechristensen »

dwoldrich wrote: post #35

I cannot figure out if this data center panic is legit or trumped up. There are legitimate nation-state and political entities that would love to create pressure for degrowth in this area. And, pollution and natural resources are a concern, yes, fine, sure. NIMBY happens, I get it ... *BUT*, we've been building huge data centers for decades and they are minuscule compared to the size of the earth. My skeptic meter ma…

>I cannot figure out if this data center panic is legit or trumped up.

It's both.

As with VERY MANY things, the people making the noise about it have extremist views and only a vague idea of what they're talking about.

You can't have a discussion about what the concerns are and how they're addressed with extremists.

The legit concerns are drowned by people talking nonsense, exaggerating, or taking the concern to an unnecessary extreme.

It's like if the response to peanut allergies was a political group advocating for all peanut farmers to go to prison and an effort to extinct the peanut species. Real issue: insane response. (I couldn't mention any actual instances of this kind of behavior without attracting the discussion ruining attention of zealots, so, imaginary peanut situation)

Re: Field measurements of neighborhood-scale air temperature impacts of data centers

#178

Post by stryan »

qarl2 wrote: post #152
stryan wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some of it's a panic, but I'm leaning towards many of the concerns being true or at least partially true due to the sheer scale of the construction. The figures I've been seeing are something like half of all current private construction projects are data center related these days and it's the biggest single sector of construction in terms of money spent. It's also a lot easier to protest data centers then AI compani…

> they generally provide minimal benefits to the local communities Data centers pay Loudoun County, Virginia $26 in taxes for every $1 in services they consume - nearly $1.3 billion, 45% of the county's budget - which is why Loudoun homeowners pay the lowest property tax rate in Northern Virginia. https://www.loudoun.gov/faq.aspx?TID=241

Loudoun County is a very rich part of NOVA and was able to fight for those concessions, as well as being in a very desirable part of the country for those DC's to built in (close to major infrastructure but still undeveloped at the time) so they had a better position to argue from.

Plus, as I mentioned in another comment, while Loundoun County gets the tax benefits the whole area is affected by the DC's power consumption due to the regional power grid and shared infrastructure (i.e. the Potomoc) so part of my already high power bills was due to the data centers there and I got minimal benefits.

Re: Field measurements of neighborhood-scale air temperature impacts of data centers

#180

Post by wat10000 »

sjoedev wrote: post #65
dwoldrich wrote: post #35

I cannot figure out if this data center panic is legit or trumped up. There are legitimate nation-state and political entities that would love to create pressure for degrowth in this area. And, pollution and natural resources are a concern, yes, fine, sure. NIMBY happens, I get it ... *BUT*, we've been building huge data centers for decades and they are minuscule compared to the size of the earth. My skeptic meter ma…

We’re building data centers in the U.S. at an unprecedented and increasing rate [1]. Is it so hard to imagine that something which was fine at one scale may begin to cause issues at some massively higher scale? If I drink one glass of wine per day, it’s probably fine. If I drink three bottles per day, I’m gonna start having problems. [1] https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/monthly-spending-data-cen...

It's not so hard to imagine that something which was fine at the old scale may cause issues at the new. At the same time, it's also not so hard to imagine that the new scale still isn't particularly large and that there are about a million more important things to worry about.

The question isn't whether it's possible for something to become problematic past a certain scale. The question is whether data centers are at that point, or will be anytime soon.

The actual facts and figures that are presented in opposition tend to be stripped of the larger context, which makes me skeptical. The graph you linked looks wild, but in a country that spends two trillion dollars per year on all construction, is the jump from $1 billion/month to $4 billion/month very important?

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