Thread

1. tptacek · 1791145040 · focus · HN ↗

   So, basically, not a meaningful amount of water at all. Credit to the story authors for taking the time to frame what 13MM gallons actually works out to.

   1. dom96 · 1791150948 · focus · HN ↗

      Why aren’t the data centres just honest about their water usage if it’s seemingly so low?

      1. flippingheck · 1791152288 · focus · HN ↗

         Transparency is not the same thing as honesty.

         Companies might want to avoid this being used as a side channel to infer the amount of their compute.

         Companies might want to avoid setting a precedent where activists can demand such information.

         Companies might want to avoid the effort of publishing this data, or the risk of publishing incorrect data.

         1. chii · 1791180308 · focus · HN ↗

            > Companies might want to avoid this being used as a side channel to infer the amount of their compute.

            none of these are reason for the country not to demand transparent data for monitoring.

            Being able to monitor things properly has high societal value - it prevents fraud (more data being visible makes it harder to fake). It prevents skirting regulations, and makes it easier for competitors to sniff out high margin opportunities (which serves to break monopolies in some sense).

            Not to mention that statistics collected could have value in aggregate in research sometime in the future.

            Like auditing and accounting, the country should mandate transparent data reporting of utilities usage for all industries.

      2. tptacek · 1791152295 · focus · HN ↗

         I don't understand your question. I'm commenting on the figures we know from this report. I don't have to work out the motives behind them to evaluate whether they're material (they are not).
      3. mhh__ · 1791153316 · focus · HN ↗

         Because the marketing teams don't do numbers and it's a high risk strategy
      4. heaney-555 · 1791154345 · focus · HN ↗

         They are, and people just accuse them of lying!

         Facts & reason do nothing to a moral panic.

      5. jerbearito · 1791156428 · focus · HN ↗

         Lincoln data center "comes online" in 2026 (info from Google). These are early, non-mature operating numbers. I'm disappointed this wasn't made more clear in the story and, of course, most of the comments here don't understand the context.
      6. ddosmax556 · 1791157694 · focus · HN ↗

         You're assuming they're hiding the numbers because they think they seem bad in the discussions about data centers using too much water. The cover up is likely motivated much differently, and I would bet that doesn't really care about people complaining about waiter usage.
      7. jeffbee · 1791159986 · focus · HN ↗

         Google prints the water usage of each of their sites in their annual report. What other industry is more transparent about water usage?

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