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* WTTW…
Illinois and Ohio rank fourth and fifth in the nation behind Virginia, Texas and California in terms of the number of data centers they house, whether that purpose is crypto mining, cloud computing or generative artificial intelligence.
In the past year or two, as the AI arms race has heated up, the size and scope of these centers has mushroomed, as has the pace at which these behemoths are being built, [Helena Volzer, a water policy experts at the advocacy organization Alliance for the Great Lakes] said.
A single hyperscale center of the sort operated by tech giants such as Meta or Microsoft — 10,000 square feet or more, with 5,000-plus servers — can consume 1 million to 5 million gallons of water each day. That’s 365 million gallons of water a year, Volzer said, or as much as 12,000 Americans’ annual use put together.
Not a single Great Lakes state currently has water management mechanisms in place to curb over-extraction, or what could be termed “de-watering,” before it happens, she said. The first step could be revising state groundwater management laws.
* Sun-Times…
Large data centers, many devoted to researching artificial intelligence, are expected to use more than 150 billion gallons of water across the U.S. over the next five years, according to the advocacy organization Alliance for the Great Lakes.
That’s enough water to supply 4.6 million homes.
The data centers, which also use large amounts of power, need water for cooling and because of the size of the large operations — sometimes more than 10,000 square feet — an enormous amount is needed for each site.
But in almost all instances, the amount of water that’s being withdrawn for a single data center development is unknown because secrecy agreements between government bodies and companies keep this information from being publicly disclosed, according to Helena Volzer, water policy expert with the Chicago-based group.
Non-disclosure agreements that companies ask municipalities to sign when they propose a data center further obscure how much water is needed and where it would come from, making it difficult to determine whether municipalities have enough supply, said Volzer, with Alliance for the Great Lakes.
To help combat that, some states in the region like Ohio and Indiana are now conducting regional water-demand studies, which would help communities determine where water is available before approving a data center. Some water managers are also conducting those studies in Illinois, but they are not required.
A bill proposed in February by Illinois state Sen. Steve Stadelman would have required data centers to disclose how much electricity and water they use, but lawmakers failed to vote on it before the legislative session ended May 31. […]
Ordinances in other Great Lakes states could serve as a model for how to regulate water diverted to data centers, she added. In Michigan, for example, companies proposing data centers must show that there is enough existing water supply to support the facility in order to get the state tax incentive.
…Adding… More about how data centers use water from Bloomberg…
Many data centers rely on evaporative cooling, or “swamp cooling,” where warm air is drawn through wet pads. Data centers typically evaporate about 80% of the water they draw, discharging 20% back to a wastewater treatment facility, according to Shaolei Ren, an associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at the University of California, Riverside. Residential water usage, by comparison, loses just 10% to evaporation, discharging the other 90%, Ren said. (A spokesperson for Google said the company doesn’t have a standard percentage because any data center would see some variation based on factors like location, temperature and humidity.) […]
Recently, Microsoft said it developed a data center design that is closed so that water doesn’t evaporate but rather is constantly circulated between servers and chillers, without the need for refilling. The design will be deployed first in facilities in Wisconsin and Arizona, planned for 2026.
Crusoe Energy Systems, a developer behind OpenAI’s Stargate site in Abilene, also plans to use closed-loop cooling systems. But here, too, “there is a tradeoff in energy,” said Ben Kortlang, a partner at G2 Venture Partners, an investor in Crusoe. These systems are more power-hungry than evaporative methods, he said.
Click here for more info on data centers and wastewater treatment facilities.
* “OpenAI CEO Sam Altman Concedes GPT-5 Was a Misfire, Bets on GPT-6″…
One lesson from GPT-5’s launch is that people form emotional ties with AI, he noted. Some users described the new model as colder, more mechanical, and less supportive than its predecessor. After GPT-4o was deprecated, some Reddit users even said the upgrade “killed” their AI companions.
Despite the outcry on subreddits like r/MyBoyfriendisAI, r/AISoulmates, and r/AIRelationships, Altman estimated that fewer than 1% of ChatGPT users have “unhealthy relationships” with the bot but said the company is paying close attention. […]
While GPT-5 is still rolling out, Altman said that OpenAI is already looking ahead, noting the timeline between GPT-5 and 6 would be much shorter than GPT-4 and 5. However, Altman said GPU capacity may impact that calculation.
“We have better models, and we just can’t offer them because we don’t have the capacity,” Altman admitted, citing a shortage of GPUs, the powerful chips needed to run large AI systems. To solve that, Altman said OpenAI would need to spend “trillions of dollars on data center construction in the not very distant future.”
posted by Isabel Miller
Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 11:07 am
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Plenty of issues with AI but the water use one is a pretty overblown fear. Matt Yglesias had a good piece on this.
The amount of water necessary to make one hamburger takes up about 660 gallons compared to 1 for a ChatGPT inquiry.
A one hour Zoom call takes about 1.75 Litres used by a data center compared to about .2 for a ChatGPT inquiry.
If you watch a single movie on Netflix, you are burning through dozens and dozens ChatGPT queries worth of water.
It goes on and on like this. It’s such a weird criticism of AI to me, it’s not like there aren’t about 5000 more important concerns when it comes to society adapting to AI — why do we need to pretend it’s going to somehow lead to the water wars?
Comment by Alton Sinkhole Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 11:22 am
Compared to way less than 1 for a chatgpt inquiry* on first example. Was typing too fast.
Comment by Alton Sinkhole Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 11:23 am
Does the water get contaminated somehow for cooling or is just recycled where it naturally cools. An important data point to consider.
Comment by Baseball Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 11:24 am
Why exactly, are we as a civilization vaporizing our freshwater resources and burning our planet to a crisp to further AI?
Who exactly is clamoring for human-to-robot interactions? Who is advocating for advanced deepfake technologies that have the power to distort our very perception of reality? Who is advocating for technology that will displace the need for human creativity, human ingenuity, for human workers, for human interactions?
Who is championing this future, and why are these people not being ostracized and justly punished for their dystopian hubris?
Comment by sulla Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 11:27 am
We’re not vaporizing our water power to fuel AI that’s such ridiculous hyperbole that it’s hard to engage with. Would suggest you look up how much water AI takes up compared to watching a movie or really any of the stuff we already all do online that takes energy.
If you wanna argue that America has an energy issue do that but do it without the boogeyman tactics maybe
Comment by Beep booop Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 11:39 am
- Matt Yglesias had a good piece on this. -
One of big techs biggest lackeys is downplaying this waste of resources? Shocking.
Comment by Excitable Boy Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 11:39 am
Alton Sinkhole offers us a red herring instead of analysis.
The issue is not AI, it is data centers generally.
And if it’s a nothing burger, get rid of the secrecy clauses.
The data centers are consuming massive amounts of electricity, driving up the cost for consumers.
That electricity generates massive amounts of heat, requiring water for cooling, which will drive up the cost for consumers.
We reacted to data centers with the same wide-eyed wonder as a kid on Christmas morn that we reacted to Facebook, Google, and the internet, without even asking if there were potential downsides.
The same thing happened in Mexico, where a sweetheart deal shrouded in secrecy granted a new Corona bottling plant with unlimited water usage. Surrounding farmers saw massive crop failure.
The same thing happened in Illinois 30 years ago with factory hog farms.
Comment by Juvenal Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 11:43 am
What’s the justification for allowing data centers to conceal how much electricity/water they are using? Seems like that would be useful information for the public to have.
Comment by Chat_BP3 Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 11:47 am
== Does the water get contaminated somehow for cooling or is just recycled where it naturally cools. An important data point to consider.
Yes. Most of the loss from data centers is evaporative, but it also gets contaminated in the same way that water that passes through a radiator is contaminated through heat drawing minerals into it and what doesn’t evaporate is eventually discharged into the wastewater systems with those contaminants.
Comment by Leap Day William Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 11:48 am
If only we had a federal government that was focusing on the infrastructure for facilitating the technology rather than green lighting all the wild ideas of the poohbahs irrespective of impact so they can make oodles of money.
Comment by Norseman Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 11:53 am
Yes, IL should address but it shares the lake with others who care less about rational policy.
Comment by Norseman Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 11:54 am
===the amount of water that’s being withdrawn for a single data center development is unknown because secrecy agreements between government bodies and companies keep this information from being publicly disclosed===
Yep. DeKalb’s water agreement with Meta is like this. Meta’s water consumption is considered confidential business information in this agreement, and the city must deny FOIA requests unless Meta says ok.
The agreement also allows Meta to dig wells into our deep aquifer on the east side of the city.
DeKalb recently updated its “water master plan” and now has plans to dig a new well into our shallow aquifer on the west side.
Comment by yinn Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 11:56 am
@Alton: I know how many hamburgers I can eat in an hour, and how many one-hour Zoom calls I can make. But how many AI inqueries can a person generate in an hour with normal Internet use? Just scrolling on Facebook or Googling something seems to generate AI issues these days.
Comment by Socially DIstant Watcher Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 12:01 pm
===What’s the justification for allowing data centers to conceal how much electricity/water they are using?===
IL FOIA exemption (g): “Trade secrets and commercial or financial information obtained from a person or business where the trade secrets or information are proprietary, privileged or confidential, or where disclosure of the trade secrets or information may cause competitive harm, including all information determined to be confidential under Section 4002 of the Technology Advancement and Development Act. Nothing contained in this paragraph (g) shall be construed to prevent a person or business from consenting to disclosure.”
Comment by yinn Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 12:05 pm
I personally think that protecting the Great Lakes is one thing that states in the region agree upon. Trump too has made it a priority, thus all of the back-and-forth over Asian carp with Pritzker. Effective policy requires coordination, but it also requires leadership. Will Pritzker provide that leadership after DCEO has been touting these data centers is the million dollar question.
Note: one data center equals only 20 full time jobs.
https://capitolnewsillinois.com/news/pritzker-touts-illinois-economic-development-at-data-center-groundbreaking/
Comment by Juvenal Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 12:23 pm
Someone more well versed in the technical aspects of the water-cooling involved in these data centers please tell me why they aren’t using a closed-loop cooling system with radiators? For pity’s sake I’ve been using them on all my home PCs for over a decade now, with no issues and especially never having to fill it with more water.
As far as I can tell there is no reason a closed-loop cooling system (scaled-up ofc) can’t be used in these centers. The only reason they don’t use one is because it must be more expensive in the short-term, and of course a mega-corp like Meta or Google isn’t going to bother when they can strong-arm small-towns into forking over the water for free.
Happy to be corrected but that’s what it seems like to me, just more corporate greed ruining everything.
Comment by CA-HOON Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 12:39 pm
Following up on Socially Distant Watchers’ comment. I used a ChatGPT inquiry to determine that 330 million ChatGPT queries are made daily in the United States. Then, through a Google inquiry, I found that Google handles 5.6 billion search inquiries in the U.S. each day. Now, imagine those numbers multiplied across every application and every platform. Methinks Alton Sinkhole may be comparing apples to oranges….
Comment by 8657 Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 12:41 pm
Just $3 trillion more, bro, and I’m sure we’ll be able to hammer out this little “2+2=5″ issue our AI model has been having.
Comment by Roadrager Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 12:44 pm
Also, I missed where Leap Day William mentioned mineralization of the water. That happens in car engines and not because of the radiator (which is aluminum and does not mineralize in water) but because of the engine parts that are being cooled which are made of alloys, usually iron (which famously does mineralize in water).
A closed-loop computer cooler is only touching aluminum at both ends, so there is no mineralization problem, the water inside stays clear.
I have a closed loop cooler from 2012 that is still working, and that is only consumer-grade I’m sure that whatever they might make for enterprise-scale data centers could do at least as well if not better.
Comment by CA-HOON Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 12:50 pm
@yinn thanks for the response. To me if there are more efficient ways to consume public utilities, that information shouldn’t be protected. We should be pushing best practices across industries in those areas especially when it comes to public goods.
Comment by Chat_BP3 Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 1:01 pm
Thirsty human: I need a drink of water.
AI: That is either a wasteful consumption or an un-approved use.
Comment by Dotnonymous x Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 1:02 pm
I know that Meta has made a deal to use the Clinton power plant, which makes me worry that that could give access to the Mahomet Aquifer, which is where I get my water from.
Comment by BE Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 1:13 pm
Sounds like next summer it won’t be corn sweat on the news, but rather data center sweat that is piling on the humidity.
Comment by Notorious JMB Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 1:56 pm
The use of water, whether pumped from ground water or surface water, is water that is consumed. It is water that is no longer available as potable water for public consumption.
Groundwater level are a finite resource.
Converting groundwater to surface water is water lost to the region.
Excessive AI water needs for cooling of the data centers is depreciating a precious resource.
Comment by Huh? Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 1:58 pm
I question if a lot of these new data centers will actually get built.
There was an MIT study that found 95% of companies found no benefit from AI investment
https://x.com/axios/status/1958548003385421975
Comment by hisgirlfriday Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 2:02 pm
Trashing our natural resources without paying a fair price for them, fueling techno monopolies and offering minimal benefit to consumers while driving up utility bills? Where do I sign up?
Comment by P. Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 2:26 pm
Data centers are a potential source of PFAS…and corrosion inhibitors (nitrites, molybdates, etc.), biocides, and other treatment chemicals.
Comment by Dotnonymous x Thursday, Aug 21, 25 @ 2:27 pm