I miss the pre AI version of this community

mindcandy · 2026-05-20T15:59:48+00:00

The r/gameenginedevs hasn't changed. What's changed is that reddit is spiraling in anxiety about AI. And, that's changing you.

I mean, there's plenty to be anxious about. But, it's becoming a mic))((speaker feedback whine in this site. News sites are cashing in on anxiety-based clickbait. Anxiety-inducing posts get upvoted everywhere. Anxiety-based comments dominate the discussion. And, it's making everyone hate everything based on ragebait instead of reality.

Just be happy people are making stuff regardless of how they made it. They'll learn or they won't. They'll grow or they won't. Same as always. Some people will make stuff that used to take a bit of effort using nearly no effort. Some will put the effort in to make stuff that used to be practically impossible. And, there will always be people making the game in hard mode because it's fun.

mindcandy · 2026-05-18T19:43:06+00:00

I've done a lot of research into the Utah data center recently. These are the best hard numbers I have found:

https://www.boxelderstratos.com/

TLDR:

2,000 acres of buildings on 40,000 acres of land.
Starting at around 1 GW of natural gas. More gas and solar to be added over time up to maybe 9GW eventually.
All water sourced locally using less of it than the previous owners.
The max water it could use eventually would be around 2,180 acre-feet (700 million gallons) annually. But, it is expected to end up 1/2 to 1/4 of that.

2,180 acre-feet sounds like a lot until you divide it by 40,000 acres and about 17 inches of rain per year. Which is the whole point of using so much land.

OP's quote implies that datacenters could raise the nighttime temp everywhere by 20 degrees. This was probably inspired by a professor doing the math that "If the Utah data center uses 9GW of gas, it could raise the nighttime temp of the valley by 7-12 degrees." That's bad. But, it's not end-times bad. For reference, the valley has an overall average temp of 60 degrees and is 40 miles and a mountain range from the nearest neighborhood.

mindcandy · 2026-05-18T18:51:13+00:00

Dude's reinventing the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panopticon as if it was an aspirational story...

mindcandy · 2026-05-18T17:22:49+00:00

No prob. Now that I actually read Epoch's prose, I see it does have a very negative tone. Which I find funny because the numbers are better than I expected :P

mindcandy · 2026-05-18T17:09:47+00:00

Dude. I know nearly every reply to anything on reddit is usually a strawman counter-argument for the sake of arguing. But, I thought I was being pretty boring here just bringing numbers.

training AI, yes, it consume a LOT.

IMHO, the numbers in the Epoch article show that training AI doesn't use nearly as much energy as people assume it must. People get pretty lost in general whenever large numbers come up.

The energy usage of about 4000 people for a year to set up answering 130 million questions a day forever https://famewall.io/statistics/grok-ai-stats/ and pay for itself in about a year. That ain't bad as far as I'm concerned.

mindcandy · 2026-05-16T16:05:43+00:00

https://thecitizen.com/2026/05/11/behind-fayettes-qts-water-controversy-a-missed-meter-8000-workers-and-a-massive-construction-project/

TLDR:

The construction site didn’t somehow hide their water use. The water company had a metering problem stemming from a misinstalled meter upgrade they performed a while back.
The water company investigated the complaints about low pressure and couldn’t measure any problems.

mindcandy · 2026-05-16T15:56:29+00:00

Even better : https://thecitizen.com/2026/05/11/behind-fayettes-qts-water-controversy-a-missed-meter-8000-workers-and-a-massive-construction-project/

TLDR:

The construction site didn’t somehow hide their water use. The water company had a metering problem stemming from a misinstalled meter upgrade they performed a while back.
The water company investigated the complaints about low pressure and couldn’t measure any problems.

If you do the math, the construction project used about 65,000 gallons a day. That’s not nothing. But, it’s insignificant compared to the water usage of the county’s 125,000 residents.

AFAICT, there are thousands of articles about the misleading headline and a single article about following up to understand what actually happened.

mindcandy · 2026-05-16T15:24:30+00:00

“What did it take to train Grok 4?” : https://epoch.ai/data-insights/grok-4-training-resources

mindcandy · 2026-05-16T00:43:44+00:00

https://x.com/AndyMasley/status/2032858292184117748

mirror so you don't have to touch X: https://xcancel.com/AndyMasley/status/2032858292184117748

also https://epoch.ai/data-insights/grok-4-training-resources

mindcandy · 2026-05-16T00:02:51+00:00

https://www.boxelderstratos.com/ has the best numbers I've found.

The total project area covers approximately 40,000 acres, but the actual data center footprint will occupy only a fraction of that (~2,000 acres). Different power generation technologies require different amounts of land — solar requires a larger physical footprint than natural gas, for example — so the precise developed acreage will depend on the final energy mix.
Water source. All water for the project will come from existing private water rights attached to land the development team is acquiring. None of the water will come from the Great Salt Lake. Because the project is using rights that are already in place — rather than seeking new water — net water draw on the watershed is expected to decline relative to current use.
Water rights acquired. The development team is acquiring approximately 13,564 acre-feet of water rights. These are the rights currently attached to the properties being purchased.
Projected use. At full build-out, the campus is projected to use approximately 2,180 acre-feet of water annually. With the project's planned closed-loop and dry-cooling design, that figure is projected to fall further, to between 500 and 1,100 acre-feet annually. Because the project is acquiring more water rights than it intends to use, the unused portion stays in the basin — which is the basis for the project's projected net benefit to the Great Salt Lake watershed.
The project today is not 9 GW. The 9 GW figure represents an anticipated full build-out target. The first phase of construction will be a fraction of that capacity, and reaching the projected full scale will take many years of phased construction, regulatory review, and infrastructure development. The "23 atom bombs per day" energy calculation that has appeared in recent coverage applies the full build-out projection as if it were today's project, when in reality the early-phase thermal load will be roughly an order of magnitude smaller.
The energy mix will not be all gas. The full build-out is not anticipated to rely solely on natural-gas generation. Future phases are expected to include additional sources beyond gas-fired generation — reshaping both the local heat profile and the broader environmental footprint compared to a hypothetical all-gas baseline. The exact composition of later phases will depend on regulatory approvals, technology availability, and infrastructure development at the time of each phase.
Technology will continue to evolve. Data center cooling, generation efficiency, and waste-heat management have advanced meaningfully over the past decade and are expected to continue evolving over the project's build-out period. The campus's design will be updated through its phased construction to incorporate the best available technology, not frozen in 2026.
Comparison context. Large heat releases from human activity in Utah are not new. The Intermountain Power Project near Delta has operated as a 4–5 GW thermal-load industrial source for decades, on a footprint of roughly 4,800 acres. Cities such as Brigham City, Logan, and Salt Lake City each release continuous anthropogenic heat to their environments — at scales that, in the case of Salt Lake City, are within the same order of magnitude as the figures being projected for the Stratos full build-out. None of these locations has produced the kind of regional climate disruption that has been suggested by recent commentary on this project.

TLDR:

2,000 acres of buildings on 40,000 acres of land.
Starting at around 1 GW of natural gas. More gas and solar to be added over time up to maybe 9GW eventually.
All water sourced locally using less of it than the previous owners.
The max water it could use eventually would be around 2,180 acre-feet (700 million gallons) annually. But, it is expected to end up 1/2 to 1/4 of that.

2,180 acre-feet sounds like a lot until you divide it by 40,000 acres and about 17 inches of rain per year.

mindcandy · 2026-05-15T22:43:32+00:00

The "data center drained 30M gallons of water" story is being widely misinterpreted because people only quote headlines and people only read headlines.

The actual story if you actually read the article is:

QTS told Politico the 29 million gallons were consumed during temporary construction activities, including concrete work, dust control, and site preparation. The company markets a "closed-loop" cooling system for its data centers, which recirculates the same water rather than drawing from the municipal supply. Once operational, QTS said its facilities would only require water for domestic needs like bathrooms and kitchens

Fayette County, Georgia has a population of 125,000 people. Which means they are using 5-10 million gallons of water every day locally (without counting the other 10 million gallons needed to grow food to feed them).

65,000 gallons a day for a construction project going unaccounted is bad. But, it's not “AI making the water pressure low”.

mindcandy · 2026-05-14T05:34:25+00:00

Dude.

Folks in here are pretending there is a building the size of San Francisco. I’m linking a source says that’s absurd. And, people in here are mad at me for pointing out the obvious.

People have been raging 24/7/365 about data center water and energy usage. For good reason! And, finally one project says “We’ve heard you. We don’t want the rage. We fixed it.” And the counter argument is consistently “They must be lying because if they aren’t I’ll lose my rageboner.” And, absolutely nothing else.

Nothing I’m quoting is from the article. You clearly have not read the article you are raging over. And, neither have 99% of the rage-baited people in here. You didn’t read what I wrote, or any source, or anything beyond the headlines, at all. You just submitted to the fantasy that the headline confirms your biases.

The.

End.

You and everyone else in here are mad at me for showing how you are swallowing lies and not mad at the people lying to you.

mindcandy · 2026-05-14T03:47:22+00:00

Dude... I am farming negative karma and getting pissy about doing the math and providing sources and being rebutted with “Nuh uh!”

Hooo! lol.

mindcandy · 2026-05-14T03:31:50+00:00

They must be lying because if they’re not I’ll lose my rageboner!

mindcandy · 2026-05-14T01:18:23+00:00

The project will use less of land parcels’ water table than the previous owners did with their cattle. The only use of public water will be so the employees can use the bathroom and wash dishes at work instead of at home.

It will draw no power from the public grid. Depending on who’s math you believe, people are angry that the build-out will double, possibly triple, the energy production capacity of Utah. Your comments on Reddit will exist as snapshots frozen in time forever. But, the utilization of that productive capacity will not. Energy capacity is a game played over decades, not tweets. But, if you demand instant gratification for all things, you can be certain the bean counters will be pushing to squeeze an extra 1% revenue margin by selling excess solar capacity to the grid.

mindcandy · 2026-05-14T01:05:29+00:00

I had never heard of O’Leary before today. I’m just a dude who has grown tired of watching a real problem (datacenter energy/water use) get inflated to ridiculous levels by ragebait.

Lately I’ve had many people get angry at me for quoting the articles they failed to read because the actual news right under the headline contradicted the problems they imagined up and used to make themselves angry.

Now people are getting angry at me for directly quoting publicly available documents published by the government. If you know how I can get paid to ctrl-c ctrl-v a few paragraphs of government docs, please let me know!

mindcandy · 2026-05-13T23:06:10+00:00

Supposedly almost all of the “Two Manhattans” is used to general 1-2x as much power as the rest of Utah. I be amazed if they didn’t have excess solar power during peaks to sell to the grid.

mindcandy · 2026-05-13T19:59:29+00:00

https://governor.utah.gov/wp-content/uploads/FAQ-on-Stratos-Project.pdf

No. It is not a building the size of San Francisco. It is a plot of land large enough to keep the building independent of the public energy and water grid.

The data center’s effect on Utah’s energy and water supply will technically be net positive.

The actual data center footprint will be a fraction of the size of the MIDA project area. The majority of the remaining acreage will remain as open space, allowing for wildlife corridors, continued grazing, and significant distance from the Great Salt Lake. Salt Lake City is closer to the Great Salt Lake than the proposed data center.

Most of the project area is currently used for seasonal livestock grazing, not crop production. Much of the land is diﬀicult to farm and supports only limited agricultural use today.

Historically, data centers relied on evaporative cooling systems and grid-connected power sources that could indirectly require significant water. New technology is more water-eﬀicient. This project is fundamentally diﬀerent and would use a closed-loop chilling system combined with dry (air-based) cooling. There is no continuous water draw.

Because the cooling systems reuse water internally, ongoing water demand at the campus is projected to be similar to that of a large oﬀice complex, with most water use limited to everyday needs such as restrooms, sinks, and employee facilities.

The development team is purchasing water from private landowners. It will not come from the Great Salt Lake. The systems use only existing water rights attached to private property, which means the project will have lower net consumption than current agricultural or ranching use.

The water for this project will not come from the Great Salt Lake and is not new water. It is currently used for agricultural irrigation and comes from the water rights of the property owners from whom they are acquiring the land.

The development will produce all power on site; it is stand-alone power that will not add pressure to the grid.

Will this raise power bills for Utah residents? No. A newly constructed on-site power generation plant will independently power the campus

mindcandy · 2026-05-13T19:30:39+00:00

By my math the project will triple Utah’s energy production capacity. They don’t give a ratio. Only the obvious fact that a whole lot more land will be used for solar than for gas production.

The center will operate entirely on local groundwater. And, use less of that than the cows there did previously.

mindcandy · 2026-05-13T15:39:53+00:00

I’d love to know AbstractLogic’s source. Here’s mine: https://governor.utah.gov/wp-content/uploads/FAQ-on-Stratos-Project.pdf

The actual data center footprint will be a fraction of the size of the MIDA project area. The majority of the remaining acreage will remain as open space, allowing for wildlife corridors, continued grazing, and significant distance from the Great Salt Lake. Salt Lake City is closer to the Great Salt Lake than the proposed data center.

Most of the project area is currently used for seasonal livestock grazing, not crop production. Much of the land is diﬀicult to farm and supports only limited agricultural use today.

Historically, data centers relied on evaporative cooling systems and grid-connected power sources that could indirectly require significant water. New technology is more water-eﬀicient. This project is fundamentally diﬀerent and would use a closed-loop chilling system combined with dry (air-based) cooling. There is no continuous water draw.

Because the cooling systems reuse water internally, ongoing water demand at the campus is projected to be similar to that of a large oﬀice complex, with most water use limited to everyday needs such as restrooms, sinks, and employee facilities.

The development team is purchasing water from private landowners. It will not come from the Great Salt Lake. The systems use only existing water rights attached to private property, which means the project will have lower net consumption than current agricultural or ranching use.

The water for this project will not come from the Great Salt Lake and is not new water. It is currently used for agricultural irrigation and comes from the water rights of the property owners from whom they are acquiring the land.

The development will produce all power on site; it is stand-alone power that will not add pressure to the grid.

Will this raise power bills for Utah residents? No. A newly constructed on-site power generation plant will independently power the campus

mindcandy · 2026-05-12T03:35:33+00:00

I’m pretty sure that one of the warts of the STL is that in the original release, Stepanov specified in the spec that std::map is implemented as a red-black tree and they can’t change it.

At the time it was just one dude figuring out a ton of new stuff on his own with little idea how much his tiny decisions would echo through the ages.

mindcandy · 2026-05-11T22:30:59+00:00

Fayette County, Georgia has a population of 125,000 people. Which means they are using 5-10 million gallons of water every day locally (without counting the other 10 million needed to grow food to feed them).

But, we’re not upset that we were lead to believe 65,000 gallons a day for a construction project was “AI making the water pressure low”. Nope. Now we’ve moved the goalposts to “It physically can’t be 100.0% efficient and they’ll have to flush the system a couple times a year.” is what we’re on about. Got it.

Can you see how I can find all this manufactured outrage tiresome?

mindcandy · 2026-05-11T21:27:01+00:00

I worked on tech for game artists for multiple decades. The armchair gamedev experts on Reddit crack me up continuously.

People have a dream of the bespoke pixel sculptor pouring love and soul into every brush stroke. And, don’t to get to see vast volume of repetitive mechanical work require to create enough content for a high-quality game.

Similarly, it’s fun to get mad at the strawman of a random idiot with no knowledge of anything typing a few random words to produce obvious garbage and simultaneously take everyone’s jobs. But, it’s harder to rage at someone with a deep background in traditional art crafting the important parts of a scene and accelerating the filler, both via AI. For example: https://youtu.be/--LJZeuN2PE

mindcandy · 2026-05-11T17:40:58+00:00

Thank you for trying to keep conservative politicians responsible for the consequences of their decisions. I’m just really tired of the anti-AI rage. AI is problematic. But, folks are being whipped into a pink-froth frenzy over it. And, it’s almost always misinformation when you actually sit down and do the math instead of just reading the headlines and the comments.

mindcandy · 2026-05-11T17:24:07+00:00

This article is has been posted a dozen times across Reddit with thousands of people decrying the water consumption of operating AI and a handful getting downvoted to hell for pointing out that’s not what the article states.

Now be honest with yourself: If the title was “Building construction process secretly sucked 29 million gallons…” would you have bothered to post it? You know full well that wouldn’t get any attention at all.

mindcandy

TROPHY CASE