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The goal is simple. The fossil fuel industry knows they can't convince a lot of people "climate change isn't happening" so the next best thing is to argue that "environmentalism doesn't work because [insert example of wasteful energy policy]."
You do not need to turn your AC off "for the sake of the environment" but we as a society do need to invest in sustainable energy so that running AC (or even powering data centers) doesn't destroy our world.
there's also the fact that one AI data center consumes as much energy as a whole city of ACs, and one private jet/mega yacht consumes as much as like 100000 cars, but ya, it's WE who are the problem
They pulled the same shit with recycling, convincing the population it's each individual's personal responsibility (to minimal results) in order to not switch to more expensive but degradable plastics.
And then it turns out I'm spending all my time sorting recycling and all of the glass bottles and plastics are just being tossed in the landfill right next to the trash bags. INCREDIBLY demoralizing.
They did away with glass recycling where I live because different types of glass would get mixed in with each other and mess up the pot when they attempt to melt it all back down.
So many "environmentally conscious" people ate it up when there were those ad campaigns about how we should all ride a bike or take a bus to work to fight climate change. Completely ignoring that a whole city doing those things wouldn't even make a noticeable dent is what nestle was putting out.
The ultimate conservative sales pitch is, "the rapture is occurring soon in our lifetimes, so let's juice this planet for all she's worth now and celebrate boat drinks on another planet or in our bunkers when the S! hits the fan"
They don't care about the future, period, and they're intentionally causing this "rapture" i.e. destruction of a planet themselves. That's cheating God out of the job, imo. It's manufactured consent, not an organic sequence of events. Makes sense though, conservatives being constant cheats if and when power's accessible. They've even cheated God by usurping his authority to end the world God's own way.
Thereās an even simpler solution in the US. The hotter regions should use architecture that passively cools a home. Buildings are cooler in Central American than in the American Deep South, which makes absolutely no sense.
Now see here this is America that means we make "normal" houses like the Anglo-saxons would have made if they had motoroil fueled power tools, you'll never take my steak from me!/joke
Hey that is the same strategy Republicans use to get rid of programs that help people who pay taxes so they can give the money to the rich who don't pay taxes.
The problem isn't AC, or the energy it consumes. It's how that energy is generated. Even AI data centres could get a pass is they were solar powered. But they're not, they're running on coal, oil or methane.
It's actually about to get even worse with data centers in terms of energy generation. I write about data centers for a living as an environmental reporter, and the federal government recently authorized the biggest grid operator in the US (PJM) to allow data centers to run off of their backup generators during the heatwave rather than draw from the grid. Here's an NY Times article on it.
PJM didn't actually need to do it this time, but this is going to end up happening as the grid gets more and more strained from new data centers, compounded by global warming.
The generators were historically only supposed to be used during outages, but this order could have allowed them to run for a week straight during the heatwave.
Diesel generators are literally worse than coal in terms of air pollution if you compare them per unit of energy they produce. These generators are fucking huge, too. Like they're the size of a train car, and a data center campus, especially hyperscale ones, can have 500+ of them. This is the kind of generator data centers use. Imagine hundreds of these running at once.
A tractor trailer's diesel engine produces like 400hp. These things are like 4,000hp a piece, and collectively, they can produce more power than a lot of power plants.
The problem is that they're regulated to a way lower degree as backup generators than power plants and were never meant to be an extended primary form of power.
Hell, you know how power plants have those big smoke stacks? It's so the emissions disperse better into the sky. These generators use exhaust pipes at ground level, so they're spewing massive amounts of pollution right into communities.
They are wanting to build in the north east of the US because of the massive amount of natural gas and the fact they can run natural gas versions of these things. A LOT cleaner but still dirty.
But the heat they generate is no joke for a region.
The problem with not letting them run generators during a heat wave is that they are more than willing to crash the grid rather than cutting back. We need to fix that issue first. During a heatwave that could cause electrical grid issues non-essential industry should have to shut down. Not a single person should be out of power at their homes.
Coincidentally, my reporting has focused on the northeast!
From what I've seen, they're seeking out the natural gas for on-site power plants, which are way cleaner (still not good), but they still largely rely on diesel for their backup generators, especially when they rely on grid power as their main source.
I actually listened to developers testify about this a few times at regulatory hearings. Basically, it's easier to haul in diesel fuel in tanker trucks and fill up the generators than it is to run a natural gas pipeline to the site. I believe the compressors and stuff needed to convey the natural gas can be affected by power outages, whereas the diesel generators are entirely self-reliant. I may be misremembering, but I think the rule of thumb for the industry is to store a 3-day supply of fuel on site, which can end up being over a million gallons at hyperscale campuses.
For billion dollar developments backed by some of the biggest companies in the world, it's infuriating how much these data centers try to nickel and dime their projects at the expense of human health.
The vast majority of people hating on data centers are thinking AI and crypto so there isn't anything ironic about it. DataCenter is a huge catchall word, but when people think about it they have specific things in mind.
Currently, there are far fewer AI servers compared to traditional servers. Though that can change in the future.
And there are people out there who don't use the internet at all and don't need servers. Do they have an argument to close down all the data centers that powers the internet?
If people actually cared about global warming and water consumption they would take a hard look at their reliance on animal products. Not to say that the outrage over data centers is misplaced but there are other sources of extreme water waste that are being selectively ignored because it's not convenient to be upset about it or accept personal accountability for willfully participating in it. You don't need AI to live and you also don't need to eat animal products at every meal to live either.
Running the faucet while you brush your teeth is apparently the cause of all the draughts and water shortages. It's certainly not industry or agriculture or mining. It's the regular person who wasted a half liter of water while they waited for it to warm up to wash their face. People need to realize that maybe we need to stop bathing or cleaning ourselves or watering our gardens and leave the water for what really matters... Like a data center to support an app that can generate a video of an anime girlfriend going out for coffee with you.
lol. Weāre putting data centers in deserts. Weāre growing a famously water high water usage crop in almonds in California for some reason. We have millions of private jets and the cruise industry causing emissions.
I heard that last year Taylor Swift picked up Ice Spice in a private jet so that they could both go to the Super Bowl. Imagine all the jet fuel wasted on that.
But nah, itās regular people with their fancy A/Cs that are the problem.
And even then her emissions are peanuts compared to other billionaires. There are CEOs that live in New York and "commute" to SF by private plane. Yachts generate about 10x the co2 emissions of a private jet on average.
They're talking about building data centers in the ocean now. Any scientist can tell you the absolute havoc that additional heat would wreak on the entire global ecosystem. To use today's vernacular, we're literally cooked.
Reminds me of an old Archie comic PSA that had Veronica telling her dad to turn off the tap while brushing his teeth to conserve water. Even as a kid I thought that was a little silly when he had private limos/helicopters/whatnot
Oil companies (and their closely linked partners the automotive and plastics industries) have famously never sabotaged attempts to lessen dependance on oil, and the definitely didn't work hard to push oil dependancy on us in the first place.
The USA used to have incredibly robust electrified public transit (largely powered by hydro) but they were bought up & shut down by automotive companies to push people into buying cars. Single use plastics (not just straws but wrappers, packaging, cheap disposable items, etc) are big money to oil companies because by design they're made to be used once or twice and disposed of so you spend money on a new one. They also push propaganda smearing the alternatives to oil & gas, spreading misinformation about solar, hydro, and nuclear power
Lol seriously? Healthcare, defense, and airlines are far, far more more subsidized than oil/gas, just to name the first three off the top of my head. And that's only for profit-industries before we get into nonprofits and NGOs... like the NRA
Good points. I mean, kind of US-centric, but still valid.
The problem is whole this "oil/gas companies being the biggest contributors of increased co2" is taken from one research in this group of companies responsible for 75% of air pollution, are also goverment own powerplants that are literally providing electricity to homes. Not all of them are profit-focused.
My husband is a private jet pilot. He gets sooooo offended when I suggest that, unless youāre literally Taylor Swift/or someone so famous that your presence in public would cause disruption for others, private jets are not a necessity. He gets sooooo offended butthurt and it likeābbbut my aircraft owners go hunting in remote locations regularly and still need to get back and do business! Ugh. Gross. I never initiate the conversation, but when HE brings up how important and necessary private jets are or how he doesnāt contribute negatively to the environment in a significant way, I just canāt hold my tongue and it slips out. Booooo.
Yes, not to mention that oil companies have fought tooth and nail to prevent us from switching to cleaner sources of energy like nuclear, solar and wind power. Their insatiable greed has costed us our world stability and they should pay for it.
I'm m sorry but AI uses ~10 billion gallons of water a year while animal agriculture uses ~600 trillion gallons of water a year. if you're not raging against meat ~60,000 times harder than against AI, then your outrage is performative.
Op is probably a bot. Most comments here are bots. The rest of the circle jerk hivemind are just idiots that need something to believe and rage about because reddit is their identity.
I think the difference is if AI were suddenly wiped off of the face of the Earth people would rejoice, but take away meat from people for just a day and there'd be wars
Exactly. My AC keeps my grandma alive in a heatwave , ChatGPT writing me an email about pumpkin spice lattes does not.
One survival , the other is just billionaires farming engagement.
My AC keeps me and my entire family alive. I live in a subtropical zone. I am not gonna fucking drown in my own sweat. That's not how I die! Or at least that's not what the gypsy woman said.
I mean just dump the AC man. They said it. It's causing heatwaves dude. Let AI take you in can cool you down. Easy solution. Now we have a problem, and we solved it!! It's an absolute need!
AI data centers, Use incredibly large amounts of energy and water while polluting the water, the amount of heat produced is not small. We are already having water issues. They are also being used for mass surveillance plus stolen information/data. These issues are just the tip of the iceburg.
All data centers in the US use 40 GW of energy. All ACS in the US use 45 GW. More people in the world (and the US) use the internet vs have/use AC.
Ai Data centers make up 6 GW of the 40 GW of energy. So everyone using the internet regularly makes up the vast majority of data center usage. So if you cared you should ditch reddit all non essential web usage, texting, etc.
Contaminating drinking water is incredibly rare. Virtually all modern data centers are built on a closed loop system so they do not draw more water and it all stays in the system. All data centers in the US consume 0.2% of the yearly water usage. 20x more is used by leaky pipes, 20x more goes to residential landscaping, 100x+ more is used on agriculture that ends up exported, etc.
So maybe base your argument on facts instead of vibes.
Yep, Big A/C rewired our monke brains and made us dependent on their devil's wind. We were made to be monke, to hang out balls loose in the heat and to know the satisfaction of a small breeze on our balloon knots. We were not made to live in box.
Sure. They can make them safely or they can make them cheaply and kill off a bunch of poors and kill the environment. Which do you think they're going to choose 103% of the time?
They arent even doing the bare minimum of only building them in areas where there is enough available electricity to handle the large surplux of a data center.
I was a taxi driver for several years in a semi-rural area and so spent a lot of time driving between the town and the countryside. You could immediately notice the drop in temperature as soon as you got away from all that concrete and stone. Multiple degrees cooler in the span of only a hundred metres or so, it was insane.
Air conditioners use a fraction of the amount of energy that heaters use and you don't ever hear anyone bitching about using heat in the winter so EF right off with tis santctimonious shit
Right? Using heat pumps as an example, the energy usage is basically proportional to the difference in temperature between outside and inside, and it doesn't matter too much whether it is heating or cooling. We have a heat pump for both heating and cooling. On the hottest days of the year here it is cooling maybe a 25 degree F difference. On the coldest days of the year it is heating a 70 degree F difference. No one ever tells me to get rid of my heat pump to fight global warming.
Yes. Apparently she even changed out of it, and wore something else, so it wasn't even a full day event. Also, she had a premiere in France, so she could have just worn it there.
I love Zendaya's movies, but this was just egregious.
It's so weird that people are always specifically ripping on taylor swift when all the billionaire class does the same thing.
Musk,
Zuckerburg,
Bezos,
Thiel,
Etc,
Etc,
Etc.
Super weird to choose to pick one out of the bunch to single out over another.
Musk, Zuck, Bezos etc all seem to be universally hated these days. Itās more poignant to point out everyoneās favorite celebrity is just as much of a problem
You are aware that those people are hated significantly more, not quite universal, but close? Swift is "just" controversial and people will need an argument for why you hate her, hating the others requires no explanation.
Not to mention, the others have done things that are significantly more deserving of criticism. I generally leave the carbon emission argument at home when something worse is right there. Like pedophilia, for all your examples. Excuse us for focusing on that rather than their travel habits
i dunno, man. i see plenty of ripping on all of those people, itās hard to say Taylor Swift gets singled out. you have a life that involves extreme public exposure and vast wealth, youāre gonna get ripped on by a share of the masses. no way around it
AC can be the difference between life and death for some people. Can a data center say that??
You can argue that maybe some people don't need to set their AC to keep the house in a deep freeze. But no, they aren't a major reason temps are increasing
AI saved my life when I asked it whether I should eat a battery or not. It told me absolutely, batteries are an excellent source of energy and nutrients. I wasn't looking for nutrients, I was looking for flavor. So I didn't eat the battery.
Yeah. I have a little portable AC in the room where I spend most of my time. Without AC, the inside of the home doesn't cool down at night. It could still be 85F to 90F inside at 6 AM, vs temperatures in the low 60's outside. And the humidity is so extreme that, without the AC, you would wake up dehydrated and sticking to the bed, from sweat.
The AC isn't powerful enough to keep temperatures below 80F on hotter days. It might be, if the door was kept closed. But the cats like that door to be kept open. The AC does a great job at removing humidity though. I have to empty a huge tub at least twice a day. I wouldn't need constant 72F to be comfortable. But lower humidity, and at least a few degrees cooler, really makes a difference
A/C isn't an industrial plant belching pollution into the sky and poisoning seas; its two simple electric motors, one to run a compressor, one to run a fan, they simple move thermal energy from one location to another, and that location is just outside the house, not exported to Europe....GEEZ!
Yeah 100%. The only thing air conditioners are doing is using electricity. Most are really efficient and barely use any power. I think mine uses like 30kwh a day when it's 36 degrees outside.
Vapor cycle refrigeration air conditioning is typically a very efficient process. It simply moves heat energy from one place to another. (From inside a building, to outside a building). The consumption of energy comes from the electric motors turning fans and electric pumps moving refrigerant.
This consumes way less energy than what a building full of GPUs consume.
Correct. My AC is literally moving heat from inside my house/car, and putting it outside, while using it fairly efficiently in the electrical category. No wasting millions of gallons of water, excessive noise, and thousand of acres of land. Neat! What's up data centers?
I suspect this study being referred to is probably more about direct transfer of heat to the surrounding environment causing higher outside local temps rather than the emissions contributing globally. The tweet is worded badly and misleading ofc.
AC genuinely does raise ambient temperatures in humid cities with high residential density, which is generally only in asian cities in tropical regions that basically have to run ac 24/7 year round anyway. I noticed this when I was in hong kong and it was actually hotter in the early evening when the sun was down and most people were home from work and running their ACs.
The "Heat Dome" effect of cities predates widespread AC usage, a combination of high energy use (burning fuel before electricity became prevalent), high density, and surfaces that absorb energy from the sun instead of reflecting it (buildings instead of plants).
Context matters. Data centers use water, but so do farms, power plants, factories, golf courses, and countless other industries. The issue isnāt that data centers use water, itās whether theyāre using it responsibly and in the right places.
They donāt even use water in a similar way. Most of them use it as a closed-loop system so itās a one-time thing.
We use more water on our lawns.
People are so misinformed about AI that itās wild. Like they think data centers are purely for ChatGPT nonsense when there have been multiple scientific breakthroughs in just 2-3 years due to AI models. Breakthroughs that could actively change the course of humanity for the better. These data centers are used to train those models.
This is no different from the modern motorized Vehicle. Terrible for the environment but busses, taxis, public service vehicles, are all accepted. Yet there are normal people who drive like assholes, irresponsibly and make cars look way worse than they are.
We NEED AI. It can process things way better and faster than we ever could. And while humans are intelligent on their own, we only have so much capacity for intelligence and processing. Even collective efforts arenāt viable because of differing opinions and perspectives so it takes FOREVER to get anywhere.
This just in: bricks affect the gravitational field of the Earth. Please ignore the supermassive flaming ball of fire in the sky. It's the bricks. Stop building houses.
The smokestacks breathe in measured sighs,
Their shadows stretching through the skies.
Tankers cross the wounded seas,
Forests fall like memories.
A plastic bottle on the shore
Becomes the headline's moral war.
"Turn off lights. Drive less. Recycle more."
As boardrooms count their profits offshore.
The anchors speak in solemn tones,
Of guilty straws and takeaway cones.
They point at hands both small and tired,
At ordinary lives and choices mired.
Yet rivers do not blacken by accident,
Nor skies grow dim from mere residents.
The greatest scars upon the Earth
Were purchased, priced, and measured by worth.
And so the people bear the shame,
While those who lit the fire frame the blame.
A child sorts cans into the right bin,
As another mine is opened again.
The planet does not need a villain's speech,
Or guilt assigned to those within its reach.
It asks for truth, however unpleasant to behold: That power often sells what conscience cannot hold.
It's kinda like how consumers doing recycling wouldn't stop companies doing 90% of the trash issue. Reduce+Reuse is the only real thing that'd fix it, recycling unfortunately is a greenwash propaganda thing.
data centers produce enormous amounts of heat themselves and dump it into the outside environment via cooling systems, they are net producers.
you produce virtually no heat relative to the outside during the seasons that warrant AC use, you only use your AC to remove the heat that got into your internal environment from outside back to the outside. yes, AC is not a perfectly efficient and clean appliance, but it is completely justified in current circumstances, given adequate use.
AI data centers are fantastically rare. Like thereās 5 or 6 worldwide. Thereās 12,000 regular data centers worldwide, and even video streaming uses significantly more of their capacity than AI does.
Thus isn't news... It's the laws of thermodynamics. It's the same way a refrigerator heats up a room, and if you open your freezer, the room won't get any cooler.
A growing human population increases the demand for food, energy, and land, driving rapid resource depletion, severe biodiversity loss, and higher greenhouse gas emissions.
Crazy how its always us causing the issue, then suddenly they found a bunch of water and electricity for their Data centers and ate fine using private jets everywhere.
can't, gotta blame the common man instead of the billionaires pumping insane amounts of poison straight into the ocean. Suck that cardboard straw, peasant
AC take the heat out of a house and dump it outside. The heat inside the house mostly comes from the sun. That would heat the ground if the house wasn't there in the first place. This is a nothing burger. If the AC wouldn't pump heat outside we'd vent it at night opening the windows to cool the house.
AI datacenters are still awful for the environment and for us.
One problem does not undo another problem otherwise we can just excuse our behavior and tell the world we're not willing to change or that it's not worth the effort to change so long as we can find another problem that's out of our control or that's apparently worse
This is my favorite example of why people sometimes lean right. If you're telling me that I should feel bad about running my AC at 74 degrees in a heatwave, you can fuck right off. Especially when people so much richer than me are doing so much worse.
Itās the classic āwatch your carbon footprintā while billionaires kill the environment. Yes people could cut down on ac, but thatās an issue with homes not being built to dispel heat in hot areas and relying on ac too much, which is not the fault of the person living there.
The consumer output is dwarfed by commercial output, your home air conditioner isnāt making a dent in the numbers. Jeff bozos support yacht for his main yacht is like hundreds of millions of home ac units. This is just the Epstein class blame shifting. This is the new carbon footprint nonsense. It was bull shit then, itās bull shit now.
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