the internet is running out of water a
single medium-sized data center consumes
three to four million gallons of water
every day
this is as much water as three hospitals
or 50 000 people living in a city would
consume in 24 hours
every third data center in the world
resides in the united states vastly more
than any other country the united states
is the home of much of the internet
traffic
but the united states is drying out
for 22 consecutive years the western
half of the country has been stricken by
the second biggest mega drought in the
past 1200 years
47 of this drought has been caused by
human activity the region itself is 1.2
degrees celsius warmer than it would
have been otherwise the western united
states is turning into a desert
heat waves and fire weather are
ridifying all of the western us
this is like mead
the largest reservoir in the united
states by water capacity
it was formed by building the hoover dam
in the 1930s
nowhere are the effects of verification
more visible than here
the bathtub rings you see are a memory
of where the water used to be only a few
years ago in summer 2021 the water
levels of lake mead declined to record
breaking 35 capacity there has never
been this little water in the lake since
the hoover dam was finished in the 1930s
this is a satellite photo of lake mead
in the year 2000 at the beginning of the
current mega drug
this is what the water levels look like
today
the lake is disappearing in front of
everyone's eyes
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big tech companies have been endlessly
praised for their efficiency and
adoption of renewable energy
and they have the numbers to justify
their bragging from 2010 to 2018 the
amount of data centric computing
workload has increased 550 percent
their energy consumption has only risen
by six percent
but this incredible improvement in
efficiency has a hidden cost
one that the big tech companies are much
less open to talk about
in the united states data centers are
consuming 1.7 billion liters of water
every day compared to the total daily
water consumption of over 12 000 billion
liters
that's less than a point fourteen
percent
it sounds like a negligible amount but
this number is less than a tip of an
iceberg only one third of data center
operators are measuring their water
consumption and water that gets measured
is only the one used directly for
cooling so if we look at the numbers
that the big data companies want us to
see
this is how much water data centers use
for cooling in the united states
but this is how much water they use
indirectly for non-renewable electricity
generation
if data center cooling doesn't put too
much stress on local watersheds their
energy consumption almost certainly does
the location of data centers is crucial
in understanding their total water
impact to ensure fast and stable
services
data centers are built close to
population centers because that's where
their customers are in many places data
center water demands put too much
additional stress on local reservoirs
already in risk of depletion
every fifth data center resides close to
water sources that are moderately or
highly stressed nearly half of data
centers are fully or partially powered
by plants residing in water stress
regions
when operators tackle the issue of
cooling they can choose from two options
they can go for air cooling which is
energy intensive but doesn't require a
lot of water
or they can choose evaporative cooling
which does use a lot of water but saves
electricity and carbon neutral golds are
easier to reach
for most data center operations the
choice is clear
even in the most arid and water stressed
regions evaporative cooling is going to
be cheaper
even if it means tapping into declining
reservoirs of fresh water
about 57 of water used for data center
cooling is coming from portable water
sources that are shared with agriculture
cities and households
while many companies will point to
fringe cases of using sewage recycled or
sea water for cooling these are often
only rare experiments with little hope
for scalability
in arizona one of the stays dependent on
lake mead in the colorado river
the data center industry is booming the
state decided to become the next hub of
the silicon tech and began enacting
policies to attract big investments
companies are promised millions in tax
credits and easy access to fresh water
for cooling if they settle in their
business parks
this is what attracted apple google
facebook and many others to expand their
operation in one of the hottest and
driest states in the country
little people of arizona are already
paying the price
in chandler a single data center
consumes all the water allocated to the
entire business park forcing everyone
else to find water elsewhere or settle
for other cooling methods
arizonians are beginning to worry as the
colorado river basin lost 18 of its flow
threatening water security in the state
people are complaining that data centers
are not sustainable as households are
told to reduce their water usage
the state is losing the battle to
conserve their water as their efforts
will fail to achieve the safe yield by
2024
too many new users are allowed to pump
groundwater while the demand for surface
water is increasing beyond sustainable
levels
the situation has escalated so fast
there are calls to ban new data center
development in the region
texas is another example of data centers
exhausting local water resources
in red oak google is requesting 1.46
billion gallons of water a year for
their new data center
the elyse county which includes red oak
and 20 other towns consumes about 15
billion gallons so a single google data
center requires roughly 10
of all the allocated water in the region
this isn't a unique case in south
carolina google also draws about one
tenth of the total 40 million gallon
daily surface water allocation for their
only data center in the state
the three counties around charleston
also pump over 11 million gallons per
day from a local aquifer from which
google requested to pump additional 1.5
million gallons
the local utility eventually had to deny
google's request for the aquifer because
the water from the underground reservoir
is already depleting
much of this reporting is shrouded in
secrecy
while some big tech companies are
boasting green technology they are
silent on their water consumption
neither google nor microsoft attribute
their water consumption to data centers
and they only report in water used for
cooling not energy generation amazon for
a change doesn't publish water figures
at all
when google struck a deal with a small
city council in argonne to build two
more data centers how much water they
would use remain confidential
why
because google considers their water
consumption a trade secret they will sue
anyone trying to disclose it
in south carolina google put the local
water utility under a non-disclosure
agreement to keep them quiet about their
usage
in arizona facebook negotiated a deal
under a covert limited liability company
and signed an nda with a city council to
prevent the public from learning about
facebook's monitor usage
it was only revealed by an analysis of
circumstantial evidence and confirmed by
an anonymous source that facebook was
indeed behind the llc
data center operators know they are
threatening water security in the
regions they operate in yet they proceed
regardless when red oak water utility
refused to provide the amount of water
google requested the tech giant filed
the petition to remove their federal
right to be the sole water supplier
the six dallas reservoirs are already 18
depleted which is more than halfway
through reaching mandatory water
restrictions and while google was
granted more withdrawals local public
utility was asked to reduce theirs by 57
in aquifers of south carolina and
argonne water is already declining
faster than it can be naturally
replenished and while the south carolina
utility rejected additional requests for
the local groundwater oregon did not the
city council in aragon approved google's
proposal despite the fact last summer
the region endured its record high
temperatures and extreme drought the
demand of the cloud technology is only
going to increase
the number of hyper-scale data centers
have more than tripled since 2012. the
internet traffic is expected to double
by 2022 and when 5.3 billion people have
internet access by 2023 the number of
connected devices will reach 29.3
billion the total energy consumption of
data centers went from nothing 10 years
ago to about 3 today
that's more electricity than the entire
consumption of the united kingdom
in japan data centers will consume the
country's entire electricity supply by
2030 if the growth continues at today's
rate and the trend will continue experts
are warning that energy efficiency of
data centers is hitting a ceiling the
vast majority of data center capacity is
taken by computation and industry heavy
tasks such as machine learning and ai
development video streaming and social
networking are inconsequential by
comparison these computational intensive
tasks and their rapid expansion could
lead to a tenfold increase in the data
center's share of global carbon
emissions by 2040.
data is the new oil this analogy is
becoming tragically more accurate
the massive data collection by the
advertising industry and the drive to
push ai into every decision-making
process of our lives to boost profits is
costing us the most precious resource on
this planet
the press of water is inflating faster
than any other commodity and without
addressing this problem systemically no
price tag will be high enough in the
coming water scarcity
google and microsoft are pledging to be
water positive and replenish 120 percent
of the water they consume by 2030.
they want to do this by restoring
wetlands removing impervious surfaces
but these initiatives are non-biting
their water numbers ignore the vast
majority of their consumption coming
from electricity generation
and restoring wetlands may do little to
restore thousand-year-old water
reservoirs
microsoft recently succeeded in
submerging their data center under the
ocean
and while it proved effective it is not
a scalable solution meaning it won't be
adopted beyond small critical projects
restrictions and rationing are
inevitable at this point
your internet usage might soon be tied
to water consumption and your bandwidth
will be limited
learning how to minimize your data
footprint by protecting your privacy now
could be more relevant than ever
avoiding services that collect your
information to feed algorithms or use ai
might be the first steps you can take
right now
and since many decisions on data center
development are made locally direct
political engagement is also necessary
mass surveillance in the ad industry
based on it will need to be abolished
over the years i've made plenty of
tutorials on privacy anonymity and
security and following them can help you
significantly limit your data exposure
you can share this video and watch it
without ads and ai trackers and new pipe
or nvidias this hurts me financially yes
but there is still my patreon with tons
of additional content for you to support
me
if you've made it this far into the
video you're already helping a lot thank
you
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now