Why are we getting fear mongering headlines about data centres? They are critical infrastructure that are essential to future tech developments & economic growth. We need to be mindful of their needs. But instead of being scared, we need to make sure we're building the right infrastructure. 1/3
Because most of us really don't need AI at all and their centers are devastating to the local water supply, the dependability of the power supply and generally serve to enrich a few billionaires. All the data I am personally ever going to need for the rest of my life fits on a thumb drive.
Fair enough. So turn down that new antibiotic discovered this week via AI when you catch a superbug resistant to existing antibiotics....need I go on?
You probably shouldn't, if you don't know the difference between ChatGPT and general machine learning algorithms.
ChaT g p t is a large language Learning Model based initially on stealing other people's literature and work with no attention to the potential for harm. Or their propensity to turn into nazis. Which they have done now. Twice! Hey, let's combine them with robots! Give them arms, legs.
People have a wrong and narrow view of AI and don't realise just how is can (and indeed IS) being used by all walks of life already.
So when you are there dying from a curable bacterial infection, remember to ask "was the treatment developed with AI?" and if the answer is "yes" then be sure to reject the treatment and instead die.
If anyone is dying from a curable bacterial infection right now. It is because they don't have Health Insurance or their insurance considers the antibiotic that was developed 15 years ago experimental. I don't see AI solving that, and ELIZA was developed in '66. Has it defeated vaccine skepticism?
AI is literally doing it, right now. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
This is like breathlessly talking about how chatGPT made Doom because you don't know what "AI" refers to in game design. Machine learning algorithms are an important and valuable tool in science. That's totally different than relying on the chatbots that can't even label a map correctly.
Maybe they wouldn't get that MRSA if they could take a shower... m.economictimes.com 4 days ago — Texas AI centers guzzle 463 million gallons, now residents are asked to cut back on showers
Dude, you are complaining about poor/lack of regulation of something and, then assuming that's it's the something that's the problem, not the poor/lack of regulation. If American data centres weren't allowed to use open spray cooling, this wouldn't be a problem. They could use closed loop instead.
bsky.app/profile/theg...
You are just making my point for me. It's the lack of regulation of AI technology that's responsible for this. If Zuck was tossed in jail for 10 years because of this, AI chat bots wouldn't be doing this. Due to the lack of regulation & enforcement of existing regulations, nothings done about this.
It certainly is. The general public doesn’t have a clue about how pervasive AI is already. Even well educated people haven’t cottoned on to the massive change it has already brought.
I just cannot see how useful they will be, As I understand it there are so many already that there is not enough "data" to run them all at full input, and therefore they are just doubling up on the work. But I'm no expert maybe @edzitron.com could have a good rant about it. 😁
"... building the right infrastructure ..." How are these facilities going to be cooled? The water sector, including the regulator, have been taking the public for a ride for decades. Do you think that will change for the foreseeable future?
The government is already progressing with more reservoirs, green energy and plans for getting those to where it's needed. We have some data centres being planned with close-loop cooling systems which don't put pressure on water systems. And we need joined up thinking... 2/3
...for example, there are already examples of data centre heat being used in public / communal heating systems. We need more of this to make data centres an important part of communities & giving something back. We need to stop acting as if they are something evil to be opposed. 3/3
I didn't think of that before. Thanks for the additional info.
Build them by the sea? Nuclear power stations use seawater in their secondary cooling despite potential corrosiveness so why can't these things ?
Interesting idea. I presume there might be reasons why....but I don't know them. Does anyone else?
I'm no scientist I'm afraid!
Most data centres use very little water. They are not major uses of resources compared to agriculture, cement or fertiliser manufacturing. We are all using them - how do you think social media runs? It’s not the world’s biggest problem!
Most data centres use huge amounts of water. Or at least they would if they could. I've just built one in london, where they had to change method of cooling half way through because the local supplies couldn't meet the demand!
Indeed, but the water usage has been reducing down in DCs for years. Modular units within them can be used rather than cooling large spaces whilst not being utilised. Most new modern designed DCs do not use water and have sealed systems.
Tell that to some of the DCs I've been directly involved in the construction of
In context: across the US DCs use 1.7bn litres/day out of total use of 1218bn litres/day. (From a paper published in Nature). So it’s not nothing, but it’s also not the most significant user. Perhaps it’s getting attention because it’s growing fast when water is becoming constrained
Exactly. Plus you can operate the kit at higher temperatures than traditionally if you design it that way.
Well that’s interesting. We had a water cooled mainframe back in the 80s, as tech changed we didn’t need water cooling. By the 2010s water cooled servers were becoming common but didn’t use a lot of water. Is there something different about this new DC?
Nothing different at all. 6 data halls, each 6MW of cooling, with a chilled water system operating on a 20/30 supply return and 8 x 1MW water cooled chillers with a adiabetic cooling in a N+2 arrangement Pretty standard with most DCs. Had to swap to air cooled chillers, as not enough water
Interesting. So how much water would that actually use? Any idea how that would compare with a cold chain warehouse, for instance?
The reservoirs in development won't even meet domestic water needs. That's a red herring.
People are suggesting lots of ways these data centres could be better, with so many already planned, a bit of research might reveal if any of them actually include those improvements or is thus all just more “positive” wishful thinking to assume they might. No mention of job losses?
There is a legitimate fear that data centres will overload the electricity grid, push up energy prices, and consume water, while being used to store billions of cat videos. ;-)
The concerns are real, not fear mongering. The need us clear. But the amount of cooling water they need is going to impact the environment. Badly.
Modern DCs use very little in cooling, The UK doesn’t have issues with the amount of water it has, it’s just terribly managed. DC efficiency is high on the priority for new builds. www.masterdc.com/blog/what-is...
And rather than being so negative about something that is so important to our future prosperity, try to come up with the solutions to the problems you see - or as others are doing in the replies here, sharing and linking off to work others have already done to come up with the solutions.
Would you point me in the direction of one of these positive comments relayed to water use, because as far as I can see the positive comments on this topic have no idea of the scale of the issue.
Stop wasting everyone's time with AI slop? You know, maybe not every search engine result has to come with an un-asked for "AI overview" that's quite often inaccurate or downright wrong, and propped in the most visible space. Destroying the planet to make people more stupid is in fact quite stupid
That's a bit like saying a Ford Model-T car is slow and making everybody lazy. AI tech is only a few years old and will change the world like tractors, cars and aeroplanes did.
Nah. A Model-T is your Nokia 3310 doing predictive text in 2001. AI is a Cybertruck.
You're ignoring two facts I mentioned - the government is progressing with new reservoir plans and that data centres can have close-loop systems which don't add pressure to water systems.
How many decades is going to take to build the reservoirs?
I've been involved in the early planning stages for involved of those reservoirs. It's comparatively small and a couple of decades off completion. Closed loop systems? The energy use is mad. But these will get pushed through, and our rivers will die a little more.
We've already seen this government's commitment to the environment when energy is concerned with Clare Coutinho's frankly pathetic bending to Reform's calls to remove fish protections from the HPC I takes. Millions of fish will die each year in a habitats regs protected site.
Because of an explosion in the requirements for data centers to host the compute resources underpinning the AI slop bubble, and the massive requirements for power that they generate, dramatically undermining attempts to curb action on climate change.
Except it doesn’t undermine action on climate change because it’s easy to tie their expansion to a requirement for green energy production. Labour have already led investment in 131 green energy projects in their first year, there is massive opportunity to expand renewable energy production.
And if those 131 green energy projects were to go ahead anyway, they could be used to mitigate the current already precarious climate situation. You don't mitigate climate change by increasing the amount of energy being used. Even if you offset it, those offsets could be used for other things
If the energy used doesn’t negatively impact climate change, then increasing the amount of energy being used can absolutely mitigate climate change. Not sure why you think green energy requires offsets?
No, you're taking total energy available and funnelling it into data centers to produce slop. That same energy could be offsetting other fossil fuel energy consumption - and redirecting it this way takes away resources that could instead be being used to reduce non-green energy elsewhere.
No I’m not! I haven’t said anything of the sort! We are already planning to replace fossil fuel energy, & the data centres are going to open instantly. There is vast opportunity to expand green energy production far more than will be needed for data centres alone.
We are already quickly getting to a state in the UK where fossil fuels are essentially just a back up source for electricity in the UK. Coal has ended. I believe oil may have too. Gas was used for about 25% last year and is continuing to fall. Some days is nothing at all. 1/2
But we cannot invest in replacements if we don't have the strong economy, which data centres are now essential for. 2/2
A lot of data centers now are entirely about propping up the AI tech bubble, not about anything actually useful.
AI has useful purposes, not everything it’s being used for is equally valuable, but claiming it’s all rubbish is as sweeping as it is wrong.
Sure. But the constant dumbing people down in every corner so they can't function without input from big tech* is not a useful purpose. Particularly give AI's tendency to garbage-in-garbage-out. *and thus prop up the bubble.
On a good summer's day, yes. Now let's talk bad winter days. Oh, and there's some cleaning up of transport and industry on the to-do-list. And electrifying heating for homes. AI is often not so much need as want. Fun.
Winter’s days when it’s stormy? You know, high winds and such? 🤔 You know the sun also comes out on winter days too? 🙄 That’s why the govt is massively expanding the production capacity.
There is a concern if theirAmerican owners start to push for American non-standards of employment .
Not an issue. It would be against UK law. UK employment laws are being strengthened. And the concern you raise is no different to any other US firm in the UK....where potentially hundreds of thousands have been employed over the last few decades....all to the standards set in UK law.
'US tech giants such as Google and Microsoft'. I wondered when they would pop up.
And why wouldn't they? So much of the internet we use is powered by those two, and Amazon. You probably don't even realise it, but most websites you go to will have some major connections to these companies.
I assume those links won't see them pay the correct level of tax anytime soon.
I just don't like the dominance of these companies, I realise they're a necessary evil.
They're symbolic of the gross, indulgent over-consumption of the west, owned by an oligarch class to produce tools which many will use to replace what critical thinking they have left. 🤷🏼♂️
We need to wean ourselves of the American digital teet. But it's England so it'll be done over budget, deadline and in a fucktarded manner. And funded, run in all the worst ways that private enterprise at tax payer expense will deliver and perpetually keep taking until collapse.
Things like that need to be covered in #solarpanels by the time they’re completed, or it’s a waste of good roof space.
There is no room on the roof for solar panels, as the roofs are generally filled with chillers, cooling towers and dry air coolers
Nonsense. They just need to be designed in. greenmoney.com/renewable-en...
Not nonsense at all. Just facts
Meh.
Indeed. And be hooked up to a heat recovery system that does something helpful, like use that warmth for community heating or a leisure centre pool (or similar, I appreciate you can’t just dump one of these next to a sports hall).
This is the joined up thinking we need!
Rainwater harvesting should be mandatory for all data centers and manufacturing units.. It should be a condition for building units that consume large amounts of water. The govt should not provide all the water. As should solar power on roofs, parkings spaces etc as already mentioned.
Couldn’t agree more. And all surface water collected should be processed via a SUDS scheme, not routed straight into the normal drainage system.
It can’t go into the mains drainage. This is usually resolved at planning application and building control stage, first by conditioning and then by inspection.
And once it's active, it needs a constant and guaranteed water source. It's can't rely on intermittent systems.
They manage it in the West Country, so it must be possible: www.bbc.com/news/technol...
I work in the construction of DCs The demand far outstrips the capability to build. We are beyond capacity. We need more builders
Living things can live without data centers. Living things cannot live without water. Want to build water-sucking corporate behemoths? Then find a way to convert ocean water to potable water first. The money to do it is clearly available.
Amazing how the Government keeps coming up with good ideas to get the UK economy moving again, but every idea is obstructed so that they can then blame the Government for the economy not growing. We have a world lead in small modular reactors, offshore wind, loads of water and uneconomic farmland.
Bizarre isn't it. I think the usefulness of AI has been overblown & we may not need as many data centres as predicted, but the internet as a useful tool is definitely not going away & the need for faster speeds, stable & secure connections & data centres to process the whole lot is not going away.
I disagree, AI will be a major part of the future. The term AI is a very generic acronym but it covers all genres of working life school/Office/Factories. It will reduce time and effort allowing resources is all walks of life to be released for better time utilization. The I/N uses AI constantly.
I didn't say AI will not be a major part of the future, I did say that some of the current claims for its usefulness are overblown. It will be incredibly useful in some niche areas & is beavering away in the background right now, but it won't be needed or wanted in every programme or device we use.
Again I disagree it will touch every part of your life and device. Not just niche areas, Probably doing that now, if you understand what cookies are, that is the source of a hugh piece of current AI.
I do understand that AI covers a multitude of different uses including many things we take for granted right now. What I honestly don't agree with are some of the overblown predictions being made. In truth I think we are close to another dot.com crash because of it, though happy to be proved wrong
I see your point but see AI as the next big step in working practices. We shall see. These new DCs must utilise the heat produced and if possible solar should also be incorporated. As ever money will be the restricting factor.
So I just calculated how much water my neighbour used to flood his field in order to grow Willows: 3,642,000 litres. He also grows potatoes for crisps, several acres being irrigated for hours a day. We also have onion growers irrigating for hours over acres. 🧵/1
Thames Water (yeah I know, but their water engineers know their stuff) reckoned they were losing a reservoir worth of water thanks to malfunctioning toilet cisterns in residential buildings. /2
Housing development in Cambridge was turned down because water supplies cannot be provided from the aquifer/3
Water usage is an issue and we cannot take supply for granted and it needs investment (just as sewerage does). But we need to look at what the uses are, how demand might be managed, how it will change in future and not just randomly pick on one sector and blame it for all our ills. /end