The AI growth is generating demand for data centers, which is increasing water use. (Water is utilized to cool computer equipment in data centers.) According to the Financial Times, water usage in Virginia, home to the world's greatest concentration of data centers, increased by over two-thirds between 2019 and 2023, from 1.13 billion gallons to 1.85 billion gallons.
Many argue that this global trend is unsustainable. According to Microsoft, a large data center operator, 42% of the water it utilized in 2023 came from "areas with water stress." Google, which has one of the largest data center footprints, announced this year that 15% of its freshwater withdrawals originated from areas with "high water scarcity."
Why can't data centers recycle water using a closed-loop system? Many do, but much of what they consume is put aside for humidity management, so it evaporates. Non-humidified air, particularly in drier places, can become a strong conductor of static electricity, which is normally bad news for computers.