Data centers are notoriously thirsty. Researchers from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory found that in 2023, businesses consumed approximately 17 billion gallons of water for their operations in the US alone. But that's only a small part of the picture: a much larger share of data center water intensity is indirect and a byproduct of the facilities' enormous energy demands. This is because most power plants require huge amounts of water to operate. According to Berkeley Lab's 2023 data, indirect off-site water consumption was a whopping 211 billion gallons, more than 10 times greater than direct on-site consumption. As Silicon Valley continues to invest hundreds of billions of dollars in artificial intelligence and demand for data centers increases, water needs will only increase.
However, new research from Cornell University shows that there is a way to mitigate both climate change and And water footprint of these facilities: build them in places with plenty of wind and solar energy. “Location really matters,” said Fengqi Yu, a professor of energy systems engineering at Cornell and co-author of the new study. Where companies choose to locate their data centers, their overall environmental impact could change by up to 100 times.
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During their operation, data centers use water as a coolant. Power-hungry servers generate significant amounts of heat, and water is circulated through cooling systems to prevent overheating and equipment failure. However, significant amounts of water are also used indirectly through the generation of electricity to operate facilities. Thermoelectric power plants, whether they use coal, gas or nuclear materials, use this fuel to generate heat, which converts water into steam, which is then used to spin a turbine and generate electricity. And since hydroelectric power plants typically store large volumes of water in reservoirs behind the dams, water loss occurs there as water constantly evaporates from the surface of the reservoirs.
Overall, water use in power generation may account for more than 70 percent of total water consumption in data centers, according to a new Cornell study. “This is why the structure of the power grid is very important,” Yu said.
You and his co-authors studied energy and water use in data centers across the country to predict where future investments should be made to reduce their environmental impact. The study suggests that the data center boom, fueled by staggering levels of investment in artificial intelligence, is unlikely to slow down anytime soon. Against this backdrop, the question the study poses is: Where is the most environmentally sustainable location in the country to build a data center?
The researchers looked at both direct and indirect energy and water use resulting from building a data center at a given location. The most promising region they identified could attract attention: arid West Texas. But because the region is sparsely populated, has groundwater that can be used as coolant, and produces ample wind energy, it scored the highest in both energy and water stress. In fact, West Texas' grid-related water footprint is among the lowest in the country, thanks to the large amount of wind energy it produces, according to the study.
“From an energy and water efficiency standpoint, states that have enough dry renewable energy sources will be the best bet,” Yu said, adding that Montana, Nebraska and South Dakota, along with the Lone Star State, appear to be the best locations for future AI servers.
Conversely, much of the Pacific Northwest did not score as highly due to the region's dependence on hydroelectric power. Although the cost of electricity in the area is low, the associated water losses in power generation mean that building more data centers will likely have a significantly larger water footprint than in other parts of the country.
Another recent one study by researchers from Purdue University came to a similar conclusion. They looked at water availability across the country and charted how it might change over time, especially as climate change makes some regions hotter and drier. The researchers also examined the water impact of Google's existing data centers and found that most of them are located in areas with low water stress.
“Companies absolutely take the environment into account in their decisions, not just the economic factor,” said Yi Ding, one of the paper's authors and a professor of electrical and computer engineering at Purdue. “We conclude that Google has already addressed the issue of water stress to some extent, as they have located most of their data centers in low-traffic regions.”
Texas already has more than 400 data centers located in a state second only to Virginia. The state's electrical infrastructure, renewable energy potential and availability of cheap land have made it an attractive proposition for technology companies. But other states that the Cornell study found to have little environmental impact—Nebraska, South Dakota and Montana—have only about 70 or so data centers out of more than 4,200 in the country. This is because a number of other factors, such as the political environment and infrastructure considerations, are holding companies back from building new facilities there. But if these states direct their policies toward attracting data centers, that could change the situation, you said.
