alt Hacker News> While Americans Oppose AI Data Centers
I know it's more mixed and complex than this, but i think a big opposition is not to the data centers themselves but to their locations. Too often it feels like the centers are exploiting local resources and community infrastructure rather than paying their share or locating themselves in places that are less likely to cause problems to home owners.
The whole process feels indifferent or even adversarial at times.
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I think the difference is that many data centers are being built as cheaply as possible, with no regards for noise prevention, their effect on the energy grid, etc. Data centers have been located near people for decades, but most of them are completely inconspicuous because they are designed to mitigate their effect on their surroundings.
Cold storage warehouses, industrial greenhouses, indoor ag, are all similar but who protests those.
I think there's something social going on.
You’d think they’d have the green data center thing down already, but that ain’t going to happen when politicians still boast “clean coal” and moan on about wind farms. It takes real leadership and economic force to transition towards a green economy, therefore you’re going to get pushback while heading toward a brick wall.
A good start would be to limit new data center construction to zero-emissions DC-only compute. Slap a ZEDCO badge on it and you’ll get that buy-in you’re looking for.