HACKER Q&A
📣 jppope

Why would people in town be upset about a datacenter being installed?


They are working on installing a new data center in town, a bunch of the townsfolk are going all NIMBY to try and stop it, I'm trying to understand why?

I've toured a datacenter in California and it was a pretty straightforward thing: bunch of computers, cables air conditioning, a couple of people working there. I know there are some differences depending on the type of datacenter, but what am I missing? Why are all of these people up in arms over some rack servers?

  👤 tim-tday Accepted Answer ✓
I’ve built and managed data centers. There’s a difference between a modest collocation space and an industrial deployment by a big five AI provider.

People in the area (and sometimes neighboring states) face increased power prices since a data center puts increased strain on the grid and generating capacity necessitating costly upgrades which get spread around to all subscribers. (Sometimes 2x power bills)

They also consume water for evaporative cooling which can increase costs for neighbors.

They are also loud so you don’t want them within half a mile. Bitcoin data centers in Texas are sometimes located right in the town center and the some studies show that the infrasound from cooling fans poses a health risk.

👤 dexwiz
Because these data centers put enormous pressure on local utilities, pay 0 dollars back into the local economy, and get tax breaks. Often they are facilitated by backroom deals with local politicians. This plays both into anxieties surrounding AI and general corruption.
👤 dabinat
People have come to associate data centers with AI. Some of the negative externalities of building AI data centers are local people’s electricity rates going up, pollution from diesel / gas turbines, and background noise.
👤 Imustaskforhelp
The difference depending on the type of datacenter is the most crucial aspect imo.

AI Datacenters != Compute datacenters while at the same time trillions of dollars are flowing into these AI datacenters which aren't creating a job at the same levels too.

The worst offense seems to me that AI DC's are taking incredibly more load on the grid as compared to normal DC's so it ends up driving the prices of residential energy too also at the same time raising prices of energy for Normal DC's usecases as well.

More write up about AI DC!= Compute DC at another comment I wrote on HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48300354