Data centers at it again

ApeEater said:
I still don’t understand the water usage. I’ve done zero research into it.
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WLDWUN said:
The facility will require about 9GW of power, which is more than the entire state of Utah currently consumes,
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all that energy gets converted to heat.
it gets disapated into the air and the equipment.
the equipment needs to be cooled, that is where the water comes in
 
WLDWUN said:
all that energy gets converted to heat.
it gets disapated into the air and the equipment.
the equipment needs to be cooled, that is where the water comes in
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but... global warming????!!!!??
 
WLDWUN said:
all that energy gets converted to heat.
it gets disapated into the air and the equipment.
the equipment needs to be cooled, that is where the water comes in
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I get that.

Is there not some sort of closed loop system in place for this? I guess I just can’t fathom millions of gallons lost daily.
 
rockota said:
but... global warming????!!!!??
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there is no way it won't contribute in some way.
from a study on the Stratos project
who knows how big the "local" region is

Utah State University professor Rob Davies published preliminary analysis on the project’s environmental impact if it is powered solely by natural gas.
He said the project would generate 16 gigawatts of thermal load and produce “extreme” ecological impact.
Davies predicted that the project would increase the region’s nighttime temperatures by 8 to 12 degrees Fahrenheit, which would be enough to prevent condensation and dew point.
 
WLDWUN said:
there is no way it won't contribute in some way.
from a study on the Stratos project
who knows how big the "local" region is

Utah State University professor Rob Davies published preliminary analysis on the project’s environmental impact if it is powered solely by natural gas.
He said the project would generate 16 gigawatts of thermal load and produce “extreme” ecological impact.
Davies predicted that the project would increase the region’s nighttime temperatures by 8 to 12 degrees Fahrenheit, which would be enough to prevent condensation and dew point.
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they've got to do something, industrialization sure as hell didn't deliver on the fear mongering :laughing:
 
ApeEater said:
I get that.

Is there not some sort of closed loop system in place for this? I guess I just can’t fathom millions of gallons lost daily.
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Yes, that's called non evaporative cooling and yes some data centers use it. Not all though, there are DCs that use evaporative cooling. Pretty positive the DC I was in used evap cooling.
 
I really want to know whats actually going on here. As far as I know, none of the AI companies are in the ballpark of breaking even, much less turning a profit.

SpaceX is going to start putting data centers in space and when that happens these things will be obsolete.

Maybe the military needs some huge AI centers but I'm pretty sure they are already building their own on military bases.
 
Toy4rnr said:
Yes, that's called non evaporative cooling and yes some data centers use it. Not all though, there are DCs that use evaporative cooling. Pretty positive the DC I was in used evap cooling.
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Non evaporative cooling still has to loose the heat, which means more cooling and more power. So it’s water or power, there is no free lunch.

A lot of data centers are using warm water cooling. They run inlet water temps of up to 80 degrees. Warmer water at higher flow rates. That allows them to take advantage of air temperature below 80 and save some cooling $$.

These big AI systems just eat a lot of power and cooling. A single nvidia gpu is 700 watts, multiply that by thousands.
 
Norm said:
Non evaporative cooling still has to loose the heat, which means more cooling and more power. So it’s water or power, there is no free lunch.

A lot of data centers are using warm water cooling. They run inlet water temps of up to 80 degrees. Warmer water at higher flow rates. That allows them to take advantage of air temperature below 80 and save some cooling $$.

These big AI systems just eat a lot of power and cooling. A single nvidia gpu is 700 watts, multiply that by thousands.
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Yup, you are correct. The worry was about water, you can reduce water usage by incurring a higher power usage for cooling needs. Oracle has an article about their DCs being closed loop. Not sure if they all are though. Also humid climates require closed loop because evap doesn't work nearly as well in those regions.
 
I'm a techno know-nothing.
Please explain just exactly WHAT it is these places do.
Besides waste water and power
 
Void_of_Light said:
I really want to know whats actually going on here. As far as I know, none of the AI companies are in the ballpark of breaking even, much less turning a profit.

SpaceX is going to start putting data centers in space and when that happens these things will be obsolete.

Maybe the military needs some huge AI centers but I'm pretty sure they are already building their own on military bases.
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FOMO. Profit only matters after beating the competition....

or in many cases, doesn't matter at all. Look at Nutanix.
 
Bogus One said:
I'm a techno know-nothing.
Please explain just exactly WHAT it is these places do.
Besides waste water and power
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GMail, outlook, Google, eBay, PayPal, banking services, just about any kind of electronic service you think of is the result of the work done at a data center at some point whether it's actually the racks of computer allowing you to access said service because it's running it or its for teams of developers to write and test code/the product to develop an electronic service to be sold and ran on your own computer or in a business. Most of these new ones are for AI, because those models need a **** load of computing power to run and everyone is using the **** now.
 
Void_of_Light said:
I really want to know whats actually going on here. As far as I know, none of the AI companies are in the ballpark of breaking even, much less turning a profit.

SpaceX is going to start putting data centers in space and when that happens these things will be obsolete.

Maybe the military needs some huge AI centers but I'm pretty sure they are already building their own on military bases.
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have you learned nothing? it isn't about making a profit, it's about turning money over. enough falls out, plenty of people get rich off it.

Profit is just a fancy word for being subject to tax, which is just a fancy word for returning some of what you've been paid back into the machine, so that even more money can fall off to the wayside
 
Toy4rnr said:
Yup, you are correct. The worry was about water, you can reduce water usage by incurring a higher power usage for cooling needs. Oracle has an article about their DCs being closed loop. Not sure if they all are though. Also humid climates require closed loop because evap doesn't work nearly as well in those regions.
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maybe that's why the like the desert, take advantage of the dryness
 
Provience said:
maybe that's why the like the desert, take advantage of the dryness
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Land is likely much cheaper, taxes probably cheaper, transmission infrastructure can be better suited for high up time or be built out to provide high up time because there's nothing in their way. Also swamp cooling lol.
 
Void_of_Light said:
SpaceX is going to start putting data centers in space and when that happens these things will be obsolete.

Maybe the military needs some huge AI centers but I'm pretty sure they are already building their own on military bases.
Click to expand...
It’s really hard to get rid of heat in space. I wonder what their plan is?
 
Ai generated answer,
How They Work: Since space is a vacuum, air-to-air intercoolers cannot work. Instead, systems use liquid cooling loops (e.g., using ammonia) to collect heat and transport it to large radiator panels on the exterior of the spacecraft, where it is radiated as electromagnetic radiation.
 
ApeEater said:
It’s really hard to get rid of heat in space. I wonder what their plan is?
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Actually, yes, at least within our solar system in direct line of sight to the sun.

Apollo used a passive thermal control maneuver to keep the craft cool. Basically they enter a slow constant roll to allow exposed side to cool off.
 
crisbee1 said:
Ai generated answer,
How They Work: Since space is a vacuum, air-to-air intercoolers cannot work. Instead, systems use liquid cooling loops (e.g., using ammonia) to collect heat and transport it to large radiator panels on the exterior of the spacecraft, where it is radiated as electromagnetic radiation.
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Interesting.
 
subybaja said:
I read some data center in Finland was hooked into the local town's heating system. Smart.
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I'm surprised there aren't a bunch of them near LNG plants, specifically the gasification side where they heat the **** to make it into gas again
 
Chevy_man said:
It is amazing they want to build in the desert. But also amazing if they don't use closed loop cooling. It would in no way be productive to just pump all the water through just to discard it.
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evaporative cooling is a lot cheaper than sealed radiators
 
An outfit is trying to put one near Prudhoe... proposing a square mile pad to set it on.... so roughly the size of 140 Super Walmart.
Yet the greenies screetch over ~5 acre drill pads and 20ft wide roads.
 
One of the largest data centers in the nation has been proposed on Alaska’s Arctic North Slope, where boosters say it could take advantage of abundant land, cold temperatures for cooling and a huge supply of natural gas for power, writes Northern Journal's Nathaniel Herz.

The $500 million development would occupy an entire square mile with multiple buildings in a remote area off the Dalton Highway, some 25 miles south of the North Slope’s major infrastructure. That’s according to documents released this week by the state, which on Tuesday issued a preliminary decision to lease the property to the project’s operator.

A newly built pipeline would carry natural gas to fuel the data center’s power plant — which, according to the documents, could use more than twice as much of the fuel as urban Alaska consumes for electrical generation and home and commercial heating. The project could ultimately produce up to three gigawatts of power for its own use, making it competitive with some of the largest data centers under development in the Lower 48.

The company behind the project is Stak Energy, which last year proposed a far smaller project more narrowly focused on digital mining of cryptocurrency. It now says it plans to support “large-scale AI and cloud computing operations,” including training of large-scale machine learning models and high-performance scientific and analytical computing.
 
AKnate said:
One of the largest data centers in the nation has been proposed on Alaska’s Arctic North Slope, where boosters say it could take advantage of abundant land, cold temperatures for cooling and a huge supply of natural gas for power, writes Northern Journal's Nathaniel Herz.

The $500 million development would occupy an entire square mile with multiple buildings in a remote area off the Dalton Highway, some 25 miles south of the North Slope’s major infrastructure. That’s according to documents released this week by the state, which on Tuesday issued a preliminary decision to lease the property to the project’s operator.

A newly built pipeline would carry natural gas to fuel the data center’s power plant — which, according to the documents, could use more than twice as much of the fuel as urban Alaska consumes for electrical generation and home and commercial heating. The project could ultimately produce up to three gigawatts of power for its own use, making it competitive with some of the largest data centers under development in the Lower 48.

The company behind the project is Stak Energy, which last year proposed a far smaller project more narrowly focused on digital mining of cryptocurrency. It now says it plans to support “large-scale AI and cloud computing operations,” including training of large-scale machine learning models and high-performance scientific and analytical computing.
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The biggest one recently is in Utah I think. It will consume more power and more water than the entire state. It's going to get approved because States think they'll cash in, and they're going to **** literally everyone right in the ass looking them straight in the eyes.

www.theguardian.com

‘Irresponsible’: backlash as Utah approves datacenter twice the size of Manhattan

Facility would require more power than entire state uses and suck up vast amount of water in drought-stricken area
www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com
 
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