Also an important part that keeps getting left out for some reason: they're doing so illegally. They are running unpermitted turbines. They claimed the turbines were off and journalists had to use thermal cameras mounted on drones to prove that they are indeed running. Then a non-profit had to sue them to get them to agree to turn off the turbines by 2027...
That's how bad our system is at giving any consequences to white collar crime.
and they (and many other AI data centers) run on some of the environmental/health hazard worst kinds of gas turbines available (i.e. cheap portable ones)
A well build gas power plane can be one of the cleanest fossile fuel power plants with neither huge issues of air nor sound pollution (compared to other fossile fuel, it still isn't perfect by far)
Same btw. for data center cooling, my office was for 3 years above a data center of a super computer in the mittle of a city and there where no sound issues at all (through yes it was a special case in many ways).
I mean yes, it costs more and many well established companies for high quality gas turbines are booked out.
Still using the kind of gas turbines which can bring back literal acid rain shouldn't be an option at all.
Lets also not speak about the environmental/health damage the production of the natural gas through fracking does.
Which bring us to a common nonsense argument, people going on and on about hoe economically expensive/harmful climate protection is, but totally missing that many oft he circumvented laws are not for climate protection but are for environmental protection for the sake of humans health.
To make thinks worse most of this data centers seems to be more about making money, then being in any way relevant for winning any AI race...
No, there are extreme consequences only when toes are stepped on. For example SBF... If it was run by Musk or Trump you can be sure there would be no sentence. I'm not arguing what SBF did isn't a crime. I'm saying if that deserves 20 years, then everything else should also be equally punished.
White collar crime is the only crime that should be eligible for the death penalty.