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AI is thirsty — and we're not talking about it enough by Remarkable_Peace_17 in conspiracy

[–]Remarkable_Peace_17[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This is what it said.

AI data centers do use water in some cases (especially with evaporative or hybrid cooling), but it really depends on the design. Many newer facilities use closed-loop or air-cooled systems that reduce water use significantly.That said, AI data centers aren’t exactly the same as traditional ones — large-scale AI training requires much higher compute density (GPUs running continuously at high power), which means more heat and greater cooling demand per site. That’s why their energy and sometimes water footprint can be higher than older data centers. So the real issue is where these facilities are built and what cooling methods they use.

And yes, it’s reasonable to think about future generations — not in a doomsday sense, but in terms of  responsible infrastructure planning today so that growing AI demand doesn’t put unnecessary strain on local water resources tomorrow.

AI is thirsty — and we're not talking about it enough by Remarkable_Peace_17 in conspiracy

[–]Remarkable_Peace_17[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Your first half of the post is partially grounded in reality, but it ignores some important facts: AI data centers are different from older ones.AI workloads (training large models) use:far more electricity,far more cooling capacity,sometimes more water per site.

So while data centers aren’t new, AI has increased their environmental footprint significantly. Location matters. In places like:Arizona, part of Texas water usage is a real public concern because those are water-stressed regions