{"type":"rich","version":"1.0","provider_name":"Transistor","provider_url":"https://transistor.fm","author_name":"World Wide Waste with Gerry McGovern","title":"Steven Gonzalez Monserrate 'Thirsty Data: Data Centers increasing impact on fresh water'","html":"","width":"100%","height":180,"duration":3110,"description":"Steven Gonzalez Monserrate is a postdoctoral researcher in the Fixing Futures research training group at Goethe University. As a graduate of MIT's History, Anthropology, Science, Technology & Society program, his dissertation project, \"Cloud Ecologies\", is an ethnography of data centers and their environmental impacts in the United States, Puerto Rico, Iceland, and Singapore. \nThere is a global freshwater crisis and this crisis is being accelerated by data centers’ incredible thirst for water. Steven talks to Gerry about the environmental impact data centers are having on fresh water supply, particularly in water-stressed areas, and how it is likely to get worse because AI is particularly water intense \nSome selected quotes from Steven:\n Some scholars are estimating that anything from 5% to 10% of data center water comes from alternative water sources, like grey water, sea water. But the vast majority is drinking water. And there are a few reasons for this. One is the biohazard. As water is being warmed and flowing through these data centers, microorganisms flourish in these conditions. That is one reason why data centers turn to drinking water because that water has already to some degree been treated, so there is less of s risk of these microbial blooms happening. For the same microbial reason, the water can’t be endlessly recycled. It has to be dumped or returned to the sewers because even with reverse-osmosis filters and other techniques, these microbes will flourish.\n Some water, when it evaporates can leave behind really corrosive particulates of various kinds. \n The data centers will come if you offer them the right incentives around land, water and electricity, even is these incentives are fundamentally unsustainable, if they’re irresponsible, if they’re suicidal or self-destructive. \nIf you have access to cheap fresh water, deserts are a great place for data centers because they are so dry—and computers hate moisture and high humidity. That’s why there...","thumbnail_url":"https://img.transistorcdn.com/WtQXM5YkHmIbl1x6ZjNQfIxBR8YGxi2GHFli7ZvW3Qs/rs:fill:0:0:1/w:400/h:400/q:60/mb:500000/aHR0cHM6Ly9pbWct/dXBsb2FkLXByb2R1/Y3Rpb24udHJhbnNp/c3Rvci5mbS80NGQy/MTg0YTE1YzY2Yjhj/YWQ1ZGU2ZmVkNWEy/MzIyZC5qcGc.webp","thumbnail_width":300,"thumbnail_height":300}