Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Life next to 199 data centres

bbc.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 66 posts

Re: Life next to 199 data centres

#11

Post by xnx »

kraftman wrote: post #5
jasonthorsness wrote: post #2

Article makes a huge deal about humming/buzzing but there’s no way that’s a real thing right? What would be the reason it would go beyond like any HVAC-ish thing on a large building? Lost me at the first sentence :(

I worked in a medium data center and there was no noise outside, no noise from the office in the same building, no noise outside the airlock, very loud inside. Maybe huge datacenters are very different somehow?

> I worked in a medium data center and there was no noise outside

AI datacenters have much larger cooling needs and often use generators

Re: Life next to 199 data centres

#12

Post by SirFatty »

jasonthorsness wrote: post #2

Article makes a huge deal about humming/buzzing but there’s no way that’s a real thing right? What would be the reason it would go beyond like any HVAC-ish thing on a large building? Lost me at the first sentence :(

If got past the first sentence, you might learn the answer to the question. Substations and power/peaker plants. Maybe not in all cases, but I wouldn't want to live next a building have has row upon row of AC systems running 24 hours a day.

Re: Life next to 199 data centres

#14

Post by jeron »

SirFatty wrote: post #12
jasonthorsness wrote: post #2

Article makes a huge deal about humming/buzzing but there’s no way that’s a real thing right? What would be the reason it would go beyond like any HVAC-ish thing on a large building? Lost me at the first sentence :(

If got past the first sentence, you might learn the answer to the question. Substations and power/peaker plants. Maybe not in all cases, but I wouldn't want to live next a building have has row upon row of AC systems running 24 hours a day.

I already live and sleep next to my homelab, which is probably louder than those power plants

Re: Life next to 199 data centres

#15

Post by ta1243 »

alyxya wrote: post #7

It's sad seeing people impacted by these data centers considering how little voice they have. I don't think anyone wants to live near a data center unless they actually worked there.

And very few people work there relative to the impact. Sure nobody liked living near factories in ye olden days, but they did like the employment opportunities.

You can see how few work there when you compare the size of the data centre and the size of the car park.

Re: Life next to 199 data centres

#16

Post by tomhallett »

ta1243 wrote: post #15
alyxya wrote: post #7

It's sad seeing people impacted by these data centers considering how little voice they have. I don't think anyone wants to live near a data center unless they actually worked there.

And very few people work there relative to the impact. Sure nobody liked living near factories in ye olden days, but they did like the employment opportunities. You can see how few work there when you compare the size of the data centre and the size of the car park.

But there is an upside to this - you get the benefits of being a city with big business (tax revenue, donations to the local schools, investments in infrastructure), but don't have increased commuter traffic.

Re: Life next to 199 data centres

#17

Post by lemonlime227 »

Ashburn/Loudoun resident here, lived right next to us-east-1 for 10+ years. No, the noise is not impactful. The data centers are very quiet on the outside. More noise comes from Dulles Airport nearby. Main problem is 1. visuals. They are horrendous blobs to look at. 2. land/electricity values. Gone up a lot in the past few years. Happy to answer any questions.

Re: Life next to 199 data centres

#18

Post by tuetuopay »

DontBreakAlex wrote: post #8
jasonthorsness wrote: post #2

Article makes a huge deal about humming/buzzing but there’s no way that’s a real thing right? What would be the reason it would go beyond like any HVAC-ish thing on a large building? Lost me at the first sentence :(

I once visited a fairly large DC in the outskirts of paris (Scaleway DC5) and it was basically dead silent outside. I guess these large DCs are just build with absolutely no concern for noise pollution?

Scaleway DC5 is large by French standards, rather small by US hyperscaler standards. But the main reason is DC5 does not use classic cooling, thus does not have huge dry coolers outside, which definitely helps for noise (it's adiabatic cooling).

Another fact is just the sheer power density of those problematic north virginia datacenters. I'd bet us-east-1 is not an issue (old building and lower power density), but the newer AI ones are. Just take a look at how much AI clusters eat: a single DGX H200 box with 8 GPUs is 10kW. Most facilities provide 10kW for a whole rack, not 8Us. You're looking at 60kW racks, which is a mental power density: a single aisle trivially gets over the MW threshold. You used to feed rooms with megawatts. Heck, DC5 has 24MW of power, that's only 20000 H200 (again, think hyperscaler scale).

Still about cooling, the load profile is even different. DC5 is a general purpose datacenter, where the load is not full blast. Your AI datacenter has the GPU clusters full blast all the time. That's a LOT of power.

I happen to know pretty well the Scaleway infra and visited others of their datacenters. You can stand centimeters from the noise-dampening wall surrounding the dry coolers and not hear a thing; while almost needing noise protection within the wall.

Re: Life next to 199 data centres

#19

Post by rdtsc »

These things are ugly and take up a lot of space. They do have their fans which claim they do not generate that much traffic relative to their size since, they don't have that many people working there. For example, if they were replaced with the same sized office buildings, they'd probably put more strain on the road infrastructure and so on. Also, some of the property taxes collected from DC operators supposedly go to lowering the property taxes of residents in the county.

https://www.loudoun.gov/FAQ.aspx?QID=1793

> said, noting the humming or buzzing noise the centre emits scares away a lot of wildlife from his area

I imagine trees and fields that have been cleared and the roads paved probably play a good part as well.

Re: Life next to 199 data centres

#20

Post by dingnuts »

alyxya wrote: post #7

It's sad seeing people impacted by these data centers considering how little voice they have. I don't think anyone wants to live near a data center unless they actually worked there.

Did you read the article? It's about Loudoun County, the wealthiest county in the US. The people "affected" both are the ones making the decision about where to put the data centers and the ones profiting off them. Don't lose sleep.

Also, those same people have the most ability to live wherever they want, and can leave. This isn't mountaintop removal in coal country. This is wealthy DC lobbyists being a little annoyed about a hum.

The fact that there's even an article about it is evidence of the fact that the affected are wealthy. The article is their voice. The wealth that allows them to live in Loudoun County is their voice.

Post reply on HN