Seven-ish Questions on Data Center Water Use

Aug 31, 2026·
muckrAIkers
muckrAIkers
· 3 min read
EPISODE RECORDED 2026.07.26; TRANSCRIPT

Chapters

00:00 ❙ Intro
08:14 ❙ Is It Really an "AI" Data Center?
13:28 ❙ How Is It Cooled, and Where's the Water From?
19:48 ❙ Where Is It?
29:03 ❙ Collosus as a Worked Example
35:14 ❙ How Is It Powered?
38:15 ❙ Who Owns It & Who Pays?
47:58 ❙ Is This Too Complicated? Seven Questions Recapped
54:35 ❙ Bonus: Data Centers in Space
58:48 ❙ Outro

Energy & Water Use

  • Our World in Data article - How Much Energy Do Data Centers and Artificial Intelligence Use?
  • Uptime Institute report and Summary PDF - Uptime Institute Global Data Center Survey Results 2025
  • Axis Intelligence article - AI Data Center Energy Consumption Statistics 2026
  • EcoLogits webpage

Cooling, Water Use & Technical Background

  • ACM paper - Not All Water Consumption Is Equal: A Water Stress Weighted Metric for Sustainable Computing
  • Preprint - Small Bottle, Big Pipe: Quantifying and Addressing the Impact of Data Centers on Public Water Systems
  • Ground Water Protection Council presentation - Data Center Water Usage: Problem or Opportunities?
  • Time article - The Secret Cost of Google’s Data Centers: Billions of Gallons of Water to Cool Servers

Case Studies: Community & Water Disputes

  • Politico article - Musk promised his data center would reuse water. That’s now stalled.
  • GovTech article - The Dalles, Ore. Settles Lawsuit Over Google Data Centers
  • Tom’s Hardware article - Georgia Data Center Used 29 Million Gallons of Water
  • Post and Courier article - SC county to disclose Google data center’s water usage to settle legal battle
  • Roanoke Rambler article - Water Authority Releases Google Data Center Records Ahead of Scheduled Contempt Hearing
  • Milwaukee Independent article - Data Centers Trigger Billion-Dollar Utility Projects, Push Higher Bills onto Public
  • The Progressive article - Tech Giants Are Trying to Cover Up the Environmental Impacts of Their Data Centers
  • Fortune article - on data center “water wars” in Georgia and Arizona (headline unverified)
  • Rain Intelligence blog - The Courthouse Backstop: Data-Center Water Pollution and Amazon’s $20.5M Nitrate Settlement

Ownership, Financing & Secrecy

  • IEEE paper - Press Release Ethics: Performative Ethics in AI Consortia and Industry Associations
  • Harvard Environmental Law Program PDF - Extracting Profits from the Public
  • Minnesota Star Tribune article - NDAs, code names and shell companies: How Minnesota officials support data center secrecy
  • Public Citizen article - The Secret Data Center Buildout
  • TechRadar Pro article - ‘Subprime data center crisis’ could threaten the global economy in a way similar to the 2008 subprime mortgage debacle
  • Futurism article - AI Companies Are Trying to Hide a Staggering Amount of Debt

Videos and Space Data Center BS

  • YouTube video - Why is Everyone So Wrong About AI Water Use?
  • YouTube video - Data Center Water is a Distraction
  • CivAI blog - Data centers in space makes no sense
Narratives & Hype Current Harms AI Governance
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Authors
muckrAIkers
Finding the meaning in all the AI muck

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