this post was submitted on 30 Dec 2025
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The AI cost of water isn't really a big deal in comparison to the consumption of water through crops and other means worldwide.
I heard the cost of water for AI worldwide is 1/80 the water consumption of corn in America alone.
What is a big deal is the money invested towards it is holding up our economy, (when it could be spent on making society better) creating fake news and impersonating humans at a rapid rate.
What drives me crazy about the use of water for datacenters is that it isn't necessary. Unlike growing crops where the water is a non-negotiable requirement of the endeavor just by its very nature, you can cool a datacentre without continuously consuming water.
It just so happens that by a completely insane series of circumstances it's the cheapest way to do so. You could run the servers in the datacenters at a lower power limit. You could use non-evaporative cooling. You could build the datacentre in a colder or less arid climate. But no, all of those options either cost slightly more or generate slightly less money, so they aren't even considered. Couple that with the fact that a significant proportion of that consumption is in service of prompts that no end user ever actively asked for, like the LLMs responses being generated many thousands of times per second by Google searches. It's just this utterly pointless pissing away of resources.
Most of the water use for corn isn't necessary either, because nearly half the corn we grow gets burned in engines in the form of corn ethanol mixed into gasoline.
I'll say that again because it is an unfathomable stat. Nearly half the corn the US grows gets burned to make cars go. That represents 40x the water use of AI if OP is to be believed about the 1/80th stat.
IIRC it depends on how you count it, if you are counting water use for hydro power then it uses shitloads. But places that use hydro usually have plenty of water to do that in the first place and any other datacentre would be the same, AI isn't special. Any kind of factory would also use a lot.
but AI is increasing the rate at whoch data centers are being built which is putting enormous strain on a lot of communities with aging or inadequate public infrastructure and utilities like water and electricity. Some people have seen water and/or electricity prices double or have even lost access to their public utilities because everything is being routed to a nearby datacenter thats younger than their kids. And in many instances politicians are ignoring the communities they're displacing because theres significant money involved.
Oh so now you care about displaced people when its impacting Americans?
I care about displaced people in general and stand in solidarity with all of the oppressed of the world. That includes many varieties of Americans including the indigenous people of North America who have been displaced and genocided by Euro-American colonialism and also rural and suburban Americans who are being run out of their communities for the sake of capital and profit. And my heart extends to those outside of the US from Palestine to Sudan to the Congo to every other corner of the Earth.
No no no, you see, that doesn't line up with their assumption that you are a filthy imperialist.
Remember kids, assume and accuse first, ask questions later!
Well I think the perspective on water is that a lot of these data centers aren't paying market price for water, and are leaving residents in the area with less water available
Thats a choice the local government is making and doesnt apply to every data center.
So? It's still impactful to human lives and is more directly tangible than abstract food costs
But it isn't an AI problem it's a government problem.
So if a coal plant was consuming vast resources and interfering with the populace, is that the coal plants fault or the government?
the difference is that AI is just a computer program replacing coal plant with gas plant has it still using resources a data center being built in a place where it hogs resources is the issue, not the data center or what it runs
If there's a remote village somewhere that needs a steady supply of electricity and coal power is the only solution. Is that a bad thing because it's coal?
If a coal plant was then built in a place where the water supply was scarce and they government was like sure you can build that here whatever and then they did and suddenly the towns people had to start importing water bottles to meet the demand. Is that a coal problem or a government problem?
Given that the government has to approve the building of the coal power plant and take into account all the negative effects then yes its a government problem.
Repurposing the water would be good. Have the heated water heat people's homes for example, give something back to the community.
Instead they heat up the fish.
I also agree that water isnt the biggest issue. Power is dedinetly a genuine concern. AI uses so much power.