It seems that everyone is talking about data centers these days; they've taken over the Internet with memes and conspiracy theories. As a computer professor, I decided to apply an academic research regimen to the situation and cut through the exaggeration and emotion that often accompany these current polarizing issues.

Two important points to begin with: AI's water and power usage. As I have demonstrated in my previous article, data centers use about 0.02% of the water supply in the US according to recent sources, and most future data centers are already planned to use advanced cooling technology that requires very little water. While it is true that data centers require a lot of electricity, their impact on power systems and customers has been greatly exaggerated. Bloomberg's often-cited piece on the subject mentions that at the highest instance, one area of the country experienced a 267% increase in wholesale costs. This data describing one area in one instance has been used incorrectly to state that it is the expected or average raise (rather than the high end), and it doesn't even account for the fact that this is wholesale power costs, which does not translate directly into consumer costs. (Often the tech companies will offset these increases.) What this data does tell us is that there are places where we simply should not build data centers. This is one problem that should be avoided. The other problem is companies acting unethically.

One of the most egregious examples of unethical data center implementation is xAI's Colossus near Memphis, Tennessee. The company promised years ago that it would not rely on local water supply for cooling. Not only does it continue to use local water daily, but the proposed solution has been delayed. In addition, xAI ran as many as 35 unpermitted methane gas turbines at Colossus 1 beginning in June 2024, generating up to 421 MW without any preconstruction or operating air permits under the Clean Air Act. If there was ever an example of how not to build a data center, it is this one.

Another prime example is Project Blue in Tucson, Arizona. Beale, the project developer, actively deceived the city and used the local water supply to clean dust from the data center. And they used a lot of it. This caused Tucson to shut down its water supply. Not only that, but city staff and Amazon had signed an agreement to keep knowledge about the center secret from its residents for three years. It's no wonder that many communities are suspicious of tech companies coming into their neighborhoods and deceiving them about their plans and the benefits they will bring.

There are cases where companies are unethical in their approach to data centers, and there are cases in which the location is just not suitable. Sometimes, both points of failure occur. Colossus 1 is an example of both, where the deception was extreme and its use of water is actively causing problems with the local aquifer.

An example of poor location choice but good ethics is Microsoft's West US 3 in the Phoenix area. Microsoft separately agreed to invest $40 million directly into the water utility. Microsoft is testing a new zero-water cooling strategy, and it published its water use and other relevant information in its Environmental Sustainability Report. However, it built these data centers in the middle of an extremely arid, low-water area. There are reasons for doing this, but, generally speaking, drawing water from a nearby desert city's supply is not ideal. It's not entirely bad news, in that it has spurred Microsoft to invest in new cooling strategies that do not draw on the local water supply. This problem should not affect future data centers as much because of the new cooling technologies that require little to no water from the local supply.