Thread

Improper redaction reveals Google Data Center water and electricity usage

356 points · 458 comments · sensanaty

yeag123 · 1791176084 · focus · HN ↗
As other commenters have pointed out, 13.3 million gallons = ~40.8 acre-feet and this being Nebraska, the obvious comparison is agriculture (Corn and Soybeans being the main crop).
The average Nebraska farm is 989 acers[1] as of 2022 and uses roughly ~1,200 acre-feet of water (or roughly 390 million gallons) per year[2]. So a single average Nebraska farm uses roughly 30 times the water the Lincoln data center uses per year. There are 44,479 farms/ranches covering 44 million acres, which accounts for over 90% of the state's total land area.
Until I looked this up, I didn't appreciate the scale of water usage in farming (even in a state like Nebraska that gets a large amount of rainfall compared to Central or Southern California). I hope that the current data center environmental focus continues to shed light on our industrial water and electrical usage.
[1]<a href="http://farmflavor.com/nebraska/nebraska-crops-livestock/top-nebraska-agriculture-facts/" rel="nofollow">http://farmflavor.com/nebraska/nebraska-crops-livestock/top-... [2]<a href="https://cropwatch.unl.edu/2024/2023-irrigation-and-water-management-data-now-available/" rel="nofollow">https://cropwatch.unl.edu/2024/2023-irrigation-and-water-man...
1. goda90 · 1791177396 · focus · HN ↗
  The most fair comparison of water use would include evaporated vs soaked into the ground vs run off into rivers vs contained in the final product. As far as I'm aware, data centers are 100% evaporated while farms are going to be some percentage lower than that(though still high). Evaporating extra water can be detrimental to an area if the rainfall isn't high enough, while soaking into the ground is fairly good.
  1. causesothere · 1791178353 · focus · HN ↗
    Plants evaporate a ton of water. So much so that corn fields create their own weather. A corn stalk is a high surface area, water infused, porous object. It's sending tons of water into the air.
  2. chii · 1791179764 · focus · HN ↗
    why would including evaporation make any difference to the water usage counts?
    The water used, whether evaporated or returned into soil (which includes rivers) is unusable any more. Unless the runoff is collected and reused again, which is a form of recycling, and should also not count towards usage of water.
    big_toast · 1791180974 · focus · HN ↗
    Aquifers maybe? Well water. The issues related to things like the California's central valley subsidence. Not sure data centers are at that scale though.
    <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Valley_land_subsidence" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Valley_land_subsidence
  3. onion2k · 1791181405 · focus · HN ↗
    As far as I'm aware, data centers are 100% evaporated while farms are going to be some percentage lower than that(though still high).
    Newer data centres use closed loop electric (refrigeration) cooling instead of induced draft open loop evaporative cooling.

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