First they say data centers should pay their own way on power infrastructure, then when they start springing up entirely off-grid and fully self-funded power infrastructure, suddenly there's a new problem. The problem was never power or water (water being a known Chinese spy op after Karen Hao was caught exaggerating water usage by 1,000x in her book).
It is not a new problem. Look at Musk's Tennessee data centers to see the problems with off-grid data centers that don't have good pollution controls. Second, in many places power is a problem with AI data centers that do want grid power. I don't think you realize just how many new AI data center projects there are and how much more power they use than a normal data center. Combined with the short timeline these proj…
Yes, Musk's data centers are apparently abominable. I'll show up to rally for a statute preventing Musk from building more data centers. But I don't think the evidence is good that most data centers are like this, and I do think that rapid grid expansion --- which is going to happen one way or the other, the only question is where --- is an opportunity blue-staters like us should be seizing to modernize the grid and impose some controls.