Americans don't know how to fight AI so they're fighting data centers • Hacker News Board

Re: Americans don't know how to fight AI so they're fighting data centers

#91

Post by aspenmartin » Tue, Jun 02, 2026, 4:37 PM UTC

UtopiaPunk wrote: post #84

vmg12 wrote: post #46

I think its a mistake to fight datacenters and AI. Taking a step back, if the US unilaterally stops producing AI will other countries stop? The answer is clearly no. Datacenters and ai can be built and trained anywhere. If you want control over AI you should want it to be built in your own country where you have political representation. All preventing datacenter buildout will do is ensure that the price remains high…

You're starting with an assumption that AI is, on the whole, a net positive for society. A lot of people would disagree.

Of course and a lot of people disagree that vaccines work, why does this negate any hard evidence?

Re: Americans don't know how to fight AI so they're fighting data centers

#92

Post by verdverm » Tue, Jun 02, 2026, 4:37 PM UTC

nemomarx wrote: post #76

verdverm wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, a few issues / approaches, largely around politics and regulation. The discourse mainly focuses around the bad cases and extrapolates to all data centers (incorrectly). I run our company workloads in a data center that is 95% renewables (mainly wind). 1. About 25% of data centers use close water cycle systems [1]. This could be part of the approval process. It costs more, but these companies are flush with cash.…

You might remember the current president cutting renewable subsidies and adding regulation to slow down building them?

Yup, mainly focused on wind mills because he's still butt hurt about losing in Scotland. Solar is still growing at a good clip. The economics has reversed and many renewables are now cheaper.

Re: Americans don't know how to fight AI so they're fighting data centers

#93

Post by yoyohello13 » Tue, Jun 02, 2026, 4:37 PM UTC

pantsforbirds wrote: post #36

raincole wrote: post #22

At the end it's a facility that costs the locals and benefits non-locals. Even if AI is the truly greatest productivity booster, the benefits are still distributed over all its customers, and the environmental impacts are mostly local. It's like if someone is building a landfill in your hometown to bury the whole country's waste. Or it's like a factory that creates zero job.

Except datacenters are actually very low environmental impact. As long as they provide their own power, they have MUCH lower impact than most farms would.

> As long as they provide their own power

Key point doing a lot of heavy lifting here. Do all these data center buildouts include providing their own power? Seems like the answer is largely no. These companies expect power infrastructure to be supplied by the government, but also want lower taxes.

Re: Americans don't know how to fight AI so they're fighting data centers

#94

Post by LightBug1 » Tue, Jun 02, 2026, 4:37 PM UTC

sailfast wrote: post #21

everdrive wrote: post #5

Well realistically both are bad. Right now our government is purely dysfunctional, so I'm not sure anyone knows how to fight anything. We have a eunuch Congress, and in response each party just tries to push executive power as far as possible, never once considering that someone they dislike could get elected in the future and use that expanded power in a negative way. I'm sure that right at this moment at least some…

We do not have a eunuch congress - but we do have a Congress that believes their balls have been removed despite being there the whole time. This is a solvable problem, happily. It does, however, require some will and for folks to remember they actually have some power as elected representatives to the highest legislative body in the land.

Remember? ... Memories have a price. Nothing's changing any time soon while the elected represent money, and paid-for interests.

Of the dollar, by the dollar, for the dollar ...

Re: Americans don't know how to fight AI so they're fighting data centers

#95

Post by ericmay » Tue, Jun 02, 2026, 4:37 PM UTC

woeirua wrote: post #31

Data centers are easy to fight against because there is no constituency really pulling for them. They create only a handful of jobs. Ultimately the entire thing is a waste of time, data centers can be built basically anywhere, and that's why a lot of them are moving to rural red states where they welcome the construction. The fight against AI should just be about taxing token usage. We should also tax the hell out of…

> data centers can be built basically anywhere, and that's why a lot of them are moving to rural red states where they welcome the construction.

There’s no such thing as a red state or blue state, these are fictions created to generate political fighting for no value to society.

Second - many states such as Ohio have begun pushing back strongly against data centers. In Ohio we had been offering tax breaks for construction because we welcomed the economic activity, but thankfully the government here after seeing a lot of pushback across the state has realized providing tax incentives or subsidies is economically and politically stupid relative the benefits of the new data centers.

To your point, they can be built anywhere. So many folks are saying yep, let’s build them somewhere else and drain water and raise energy prices there instead of here.

Smart politics in a state like Ohio would require data centers to relocate corporate jobs to the state or face full or perhaps even surcharges for utility rates because why not?

Re: Americans don't know how to fight AI so they're fighting data centers

#96

Post by unglaublich » Tue, Jun 02, 2026, 4:38 PM UTC

everdrive wrote: post #58

john_strinlai wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm actually confused about why datacenters raise electric costs electrical supply is not infinite. datacenters have high electrical demand. more demand + same supply = increase prices. > Why doesn't the data center bear an extra cost for the added infrastructure? the problem is that added infrastructure is not built instantaneously. it lags behind. so costs will be high until more supply-side infrastructure is in…

Thanks, that's really useful. I guess in my head I had the impression that costs could potentially be static. eg: if you had 10 customers total, each needed to pay $1 to generate electricity to serve their needs. So when you scale up to 100 customers, you can still have everyone pay $1 and come out to the same place. I totally get the general principle that not everything scales linearly like that. But, I also know v…

Generally, electric networks benefit from economies of scale. So more customers will _lower_ prices per-customer in the long term.

Re: Americans don't know how to fight AI so they're fighting data centers

#97

Post by cucumber3732842 » Tue, Jun 02, 2026, 4:39 PM UTC

avidiax wrote: post #61

everdrive wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On this note, I'm actually confused about why datacenters raise electric costs. Why doesn't the data center bear an extra cost for the added infrastructure? If I build a house on undeveloped land and the electric company needs to run lines, do I also (in a much smaller way than a data center) increase the costs for all other customers? Is everything always just spread evenly?

Yes. That is a central problem with power distribution in California. The cities are paying exorbitant prices for electricity to pay for safer infrastructure for rural customers (undergrounding). Some cities have divested from PG&E and enjoy much lower electricity prices as a result.

But it's a circular problem. The price wouldn't be exorbitant if these rural areas were left to their own devices. But their utility build outs must be done per rules passed at the behest of the richer urban areas.

We're dealing with this bullshit in my own city in another state. From the parks to the roads to the sidewalks to the library every goddamn thing we touch gets driven up to the point of "can't actually do what we wanted" in cost because some rich assholes 100mi away in the vicinity of the capitol have taken a "build it fancy and rich or don't build it at all" attitude and enshrined that in state law and rules.

Sometimes they'll be so kind as to eat part of the cost with state grants, as long as we sell our freedom away in other ways.

Re: Americans don't know how to fight AI so they're fighting data centers

#98

Post by kami23 » Tue, Jun 02, 2026, 4:39 PM UTC

aspenmartin wrote: post #91

UtopiaPunk wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're starting with an assumption that AI is, on the whole, a net positive for society. A lot of people would disagree.

Of course and a lot of people disagree that vaccines work, why does this negate any hard evidence?

I am unsure what you mean by hard evidence in the context of AI then, what is the evidence we are negating in your view?

Re: Americans don't know how to fight AI so they're fighting data centers

#99

Post by UtopiaPunk » Tue, Jun 02, 2026, 4:39 PM UTC

goatlover wrote: post #64

catigula wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no such thing as 'control over AI'; that goes double for someone who is a complete nobody plebian with a little baby stock portfolio. You know, basically everyone except for a select few.

The industry can be regulated and taxed like anything else.

Yeah, and it should be. But the USA, at least in this current moment, builds regulations catering to corporations and the rich over people's general needs. So the regulations that are on the table at the national level are ineffective.

It's easier for normal people to influence local regulations, but local regulations just push the problem somewhere else. However disdain for AI is so widespread that this is actually kind of effective.

Re: Americans don't know how to fight AI so they're fighting data centers

#100

Post by ehellknight » Tue, Jun 02, 2026, 4:39 PM UTC

I agree with the datacenter hate in spirit, but the thing that always bothers me is that most of us working in tech have been telling John Q. Public for DECADES not to trust big tech. Don't put all your data in the cloud, switch to open source alternatives, keep your physical media (or copy it) and don't rely on streaming, etc. I personally have offered my time and knowledge on numerous occasions to help someone make the switch from say, Windows to Linux, Google Drive to a NAS, etc. I've always tried to be as helpful as I can, avoiding jargon, breaking everything down into simple terms, making it easy to understand, being excited to teach people a way to interact with technology without being abused by a corporation.

You know what I learned? Nobody wants to. People will always choose the more convenient option no matter how bad it is in the long run, even when the far more ethical option is only just slightly less convenient. They choose instant gratification every time. They'll whine about it, they'll swear each new enshittified update or price hike is the last straw, but they will keep paying the bill.

And don't even get me started on trying to get people to donate money to open source projects.

So maybe it counts as victim blaming, and the sociopathic techbros that run these companies are certainly responsible for their own behavior, but, at a certain point... it's hard to blame the lion when the tourists keep walking into its den.

Ya'll wanted the cloud, you wanted Ring doorbells, you wanted Alexas, you wanted Kindles, you wanted ChatGPT to write your emails for you, you wanted iPhones... We've been telling you for years: It's just someone else's computer.