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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.

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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.

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