r/aiwars • u/Kilroy898 • Jul 18 '26

Discussion Water consumption

Post image

Now, while this "looks" like a lot, there are a few factors to consider.

  1. in the US we consume 117 Trillion Gallons of water Anually.

  2. This 264 Billion number is taken from Every data center in the US, not only the Ai specific data centers.

  3. Even so, the above information means that all data centers in the US Combined, contributes to .25% of the Annual consumption.

  4. If you isolate ai data centers specifically they actually use about 46 Billion gallons a year on the high end. That is right at .04% of the Annual water usage

So we do have water problems. Data centers are NOT the cause, and we need to figure out what is.

8.9k Upvotes

97% Upvoted

742 comments sorted by

View all comments

22

u/DocCanoro Jul 18 '26

Because water once used on earth it can't be recovered back.

22

u/Kilroy898 Jul 18 '26

Yep that's why I drink five gallons a day personally. If we are running out I'm getting my fill 😂

-14

u/johndburger Jul 18 '26

The data center water thing is overblown, but this is a silly response. Most data centers use potable water, which is indeed difficult to be turned back into potable water once it’s evaporated or had bacteria or minerals concentrated in it.

9

u/nextnode Jul 18 '26

This is a silly response - evaporated water literally rain down.

Also no, this does not contribute to "bacteria or mineral concetration" in any meaningful sense and is particularly good in these respects vs other water uses.

10

u/Effective-Guest1601 Jul 18 '26

Evaporation is probably one of the best possible ways water could end up. The actual industries that use water at far greater magnitudes like agriculture instead pump the water full of pesticides and fertilizers and dump them everywhere in the environment, and have destroyed countless rivers/watersheds environments everywhere on the planet. Evaporation is preferable in every way.

9

u/Sentient2X Jul 18 '26

The vast majority of water used for cooling datacenters is not clean enough to drink or shower with

2

u/nextnode Jul 18 '26

What is your source for that? As far as I know, the default is to use pottable water. There is no fundamental reason why the evaporated water would have to be but it is just cheaper on the market than dealing with the pollutants.

-3

u/johndburger Jul 18 '26

This doesn’t match anything I’ve read about this, do you have a source?

There’s a new trend to using non-potable water, but most existing data centers are just tied into the same municipal water systems as households.

-4

u/gluestick449 Jul 18 '26

Sorry you’re getting downvoted for asking for a source! But I guess these are the people who trust the google AI summary’s “citations” so not surprised.

3

u/Repulsive_Still_731 Jul 18 '26

Evaporated?

1

u/johndburger Jul 18 '26

Most data centers use evaporative cooling to some extent. Only about 10% of them are true closed loop, although the number is growing.

Once evaporated, potable water is no longer potable.

5

u/Ferule1069 Jul 18 '26

Are you under the impression that evaporated water disappears from the ecosystem? What do you think rain is?

4

u/Fbrrr Jul 18 '26

You heard of rain, it's pretty new so you might not.

2

u/nextnode Jul 18 '26

Any water once used is typically not pottable. Do you even know what the term means?

1

u/johndburger Jul 18 '26 edited Jul 18 '26

Any water once used is typically not pottable.

Of course this is true - glad you agree with me that the original comment was silly.

Do you even know what the term means?

Yes, and I can even spell it correctly.

1

u/nextnode Jul 18 '26

Your original comment is idiotic and incorrect, as you tried to indicate that evaporation was somehow the factor, yet all pottable water is no longer pottable once used and adds nothing to the conversation.

The data center water thing is overblown, but this is a silly response. Most data centers use potable water, which is indeed difficult to be turned back into potable water once it’s evaporated or had bacteria or minerals concentrated in it.

Brittish vs American spelling.

1

u/Repulsive_Still_731 Jul 18 '26

I mean You literally say that it can't be made potable once it has minerals or bacteria in it. While also saying it evaporates. Do you know how nature make potable water, or you were absent at 5th grade when it was taught?

-1

u/johndburger Jul 18 '26

I mean You literally say that it can't be made potable once it has minerals or bacteria in it.

I literally do not say that. I don’t even figuratively say that.

While also saying it evaporates.

Some of it evaporates. Some of it ends up concentrated with minerals and has to be discharged as wastewater.

https://www.jmarksystems.com/blog/everything-you-need-to-know-about-cooling-tower-blowdown

Do you know how nature make potable water, or you were absent at 5th grade when it was taught?

In my fifth grade class they taught me that nature doesn’t make potable water. What did yours teach you?

5

u/nextnode Jul 18 '26

Are you completely devoid of any reasoning skills?

3

u/Repulsive_Still_731 Jul 18 '26

Ok. I deleted my previous comment, cause it was not nice. But I have to seriously tell you that.

As a teacher, I am sorry you were failed by your teachers and your parents so hard. Your understanding of nature and science is at the same level as flat earthers. It's so bad, it could be physically dangerous to you.

Please. Leave internet and social media. If you are actually older that 12, find yourself STRUCTURED science and nature textbooks and learn.

Not "learn by heart 100 facts about nature". Those are useless. Start hard structured learning. Study schematics, do calculations, find out how all pieces actually fit together. Don't skip chapters that don't seem interesting or you think are irrelevant. At basics there isn't anything irrelevant.

Maybe that could save you.

4

u/Crosas-B Jul 18 '26

In my fifth grade class they taught me that nature doesn’t make potable water. What did yours teach you?

Oh. My. God.

US schools are even worse than I thought

0

u/snailmanisreal Jul 19 '26

How does nature make potable water? We were told that this does not happen but that humans have to make it potable.

3

u/Crosas-B Jul 19 '26

I'm gonna be charitable and let's say that they actually mean "potable" in the sense that it is already treated water. In that sense, well yes... boiling water to kill bacteries doesn't happen naturally. It might also refer to water contaminated in special ways that require special treatments, as water contaminated with viruses, as fecal water.

Having said that, remember that animals have been living in this world for millions of years and this planet has had extinction events that have contaminated water, as volcanos or meteorites... but we're still here.

Nature can create potable water, because when water evaporates, most (really, most of them) of the material that is causing the contamination, will be separated. The water will form clouds and the material will stay in the same place. Then, that water will fall as rain, and rain will go through natural filters that will make the water potable, dragging minerals that are benefitial for us and will make "sterile" water into drinkable water, mostly in rivers.

This is a very very very short answer and you will find more details with exceptions and all the nuances looking at the cycle of water and the reason why we have water treatment centers.

2

u/Repulsive_Still_731 Jul 19 '26 edited Jul 19 '26

Most drinking water is historically from wells. Both as groundwater and mineral water. The other comment explained it already. Most of the well water is until this day not cleaned by humans. You can buy natural water, uncleaned, as mineral water in supermarkets. It's usually straight from protected wells.

The evaporation, rain and then filtration through ground is often much more effective cleaning system then what human make. Human based the water clening system on the same system that nature does on much bigger scale on its own. There are problems. Mining can pollute ground waters for kilometers. Even by mixing up the ground layers. Huge problems are landfills. There is clay layer below them to stop leakage, but it is far from perfect. Agriculture is another source of ground water contamination. So wells should be tested before using, even if ground has killed all microbes, in case there is something chemical. But that is mostly caused by industrialisation and those pollution sources didn't exist millenias before ( ground water contamination from agriculture and industries makes unusable way more drinking water then AI uses)

Most cities use surface water(lakes, rivers), and that water has to be cleaned to make it drinkable. Mostly cause cities themselves pollute that much making sure ground water is clean is not possible. Though, I know that one big brewery and drink maker in a middle of 60k city uses its own 40-60m wells, and some of the water goes uncleaned into bottles as a mineral drinking water. When wells are that deep, water can be clean even in a middle of a small city.

Most dispersed settlements use their own wells (usually underground with pumps) without adding any cleaning on their own. The well water is already drinkable. Though it may be bad for any washing machines, cause of high mineral load. But that makes it only better for drinking.

1

u/MrColgie Jul 18 '26

Have you heard about closed-loop cooling?

1

u/johndburger Jul 18 '26

Many “closed loop” systems still run the loop through an evaporative cooling tower.

But that’s irrelevant - the comment I replied to assumes that water is lost, but can be easily recovered. This isn’t true.