Does it matter? I don't think anyone expects the current LLM generation to be profitable in the next few years. The bet I think is that OpenAI will be the first to develop ASI or at least among the leaders of the race.
The bet is the "total addressable market" that is: theres enough demand to payout trillions and trillions.
The type of AI is arbitrary. The money is to create a huge dependency layer and its a huge drlusion youre seeing as data center fights.
In other words, if AI really demands these values, what are the product and will there actually be buyers at that price point. The singularity then is not about self improving AI, BUT self improving capitalism where one business controls all the resources and one person consumes them all and the rest of use pray for trickle down economics.
I would expect that a golf course construction is relatively rare event. And there is definitely no explosion of new golf courses. Total DC power consumption growth is practically exponential for the last 5 years.
>I would expect that a golf course construction is relatively rare event
That's just status quo bias, given that they're an ongoing source of water consumption. "oh it doesn't matter that [thing] is guzzling water, because it's already there!".
Exactly right. It's a lot easier to prevent an asshat venture than it is to dismantle it. Now that the public is aware, I wouldn't be surprised if new golf courses start getting the same treatment.
They haven’t been. I’m aware of new golf courses being planned in my area and I hear nothing but enthusiasm. Literally no one brings up water consumption as a concern.
This whole thing is a sublimation of vaguer anxieties about AI (which are perfectly rational!) into areas where people feel like they can make more concrete objections that are likelier to succeed. The water thing is completely fake, whether people think so or not.
Not entirely. Lack of regulations mean recycled water facilities can end up being consumption facilities with pollution risk. Also Meta plans to restore as much water as they use by 2030. Which, seems like a while to break even. That's primarily because ai data centers require a lot more cooling water and power than traditional ones. So, you can scream fake news all you want, but it is a concern and it is a good way to oppose ai in general. And power consumption, noise pollution, and pollution are also serious issues. "Whatabout this worse thing" is a pretty terrible argument. You can whatabout anything, but it doesn't make that thing any less bad. aka two wrongs don't make a right.
It’s not just whataboutism, it’s pointing out that the people up in arms about data center water usage don’t even know about the long list of things that use way more water than data centers, and when told, they don’t care.
I think it’s pretty reasonable to conclude that their beef is not really with water usage as much as a general hatred of AI, big tech, etc, and water usage is an easy thing to focus on.
OpenAI leaked financial data (2025) suggests this - it has $5.7 billion for marketing which 44% of revenue. It’s hard to explain where these billions go other than into subsidised subscription plans and a free tier.
I have an impression that most CxO are driven by FOMO. Having a fixed R&D budget (no cheap credit anymore) to get $$$ for tokens they are laying off developers.
Destroying own wells only to import gas does nothing to reduce the carbon footprint (it's actually increases it if you'll account emissions from LNG tankers). Efforts should be directed into non-carbon generation and electrification. And if it will be competitive there will be little incentives for the next government to restart the production.
> When interest rates are high, companies and investors don't take out loans
And yet companies borrowing for AI capex like never before - total amount of debt is staggering. And it’s not only likes of OpenAI/Anthropic, companies which had positive cash flow for many years started to borrow too.
> Datacenters do not need water. It is just slightly cheaper for them than cooling with electricity.
As long as electricity at least partially produced using fossil fuel I would prefer data-centers to use as little electricity as possible. There are regions which are getting plenty of rainfall on average (which can be collected and stored) or were getting some water from rivers will have negligible ecological impact.
But currently DC operators have little incentives to choose DC location based on outdoor temperature or water availability and there are plenty of DCs in hot and arid regions.
Differences in air temperature are largely below the noise floor in terms of impact on data center cost. Slightly lower energy prices and other operational or capital costs are more than enough to offset significantly hotter climate. Arid climates improve evaporative cooling efficiency.
I would say what we do care about is the number of people who were not able to use the system successfully through no fault of their own. Even 0.001% failure rate is too high when is affects more than a few people per year. Especially so when there is no easy way to rectify the problem.
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