- Microsoft promises to replenish water and pay for energy used by its new data centers
- Next data centers will be ‘community first,’ he promises
- Backlash over environmentally damaging data centers has delayed projects
Microsoft announced its new initiative to build a “community-driven AI infrastructure,” which the company says is a “commitment to doing this work differently than some others and to doing it responsibly.”
As part of this, the tech giant promises to cover the financial cost of energy consumed by data centers, a burden that until now has fallen on the consumer – with current estimates calculating that AI infrastructure will see energy demand rise almost 300% by 2035.
This commitment from Microsoft comes after President Trump called on tech companies to “pay for themselves” for their data centers, where he singled out Microsoft for leading the charge among tech companies and taking responsibility for their own infrastructure.
Different from “some others”
“This commits us to taking the concrete steps necessary to be a good neighbor in the communities where we build, own and operate our data centers,” Microsoft added. “This reflects our sense of civic responsibility as well as a broad, long-term view of what it will take to successfully run an AI infrastructure business. In short, we will set the bar high.”
This commitment comes in five forms; paying utility rates to ensure energy prices don’t rise, replenishing more water than the data center uses, creating jobs for residents, paying taxes to invest in local infrastructure, and investing in local AI training and nonprofits.
Data centers have been notoriously blamed for creating serious and substantial problems with water supplies (particularly in areas typically facing drought and water shortage issues) – with some local homeowners reporting they have lost access to potable water.
Although these data centers may resemble large factories or manufacturing plants with similar environmental concerns, it is important to note that these data centers create very few jobs once built, requiring only a small number of technicians to maintain the center.
It’s not surprising to see these commitments of goodwill from tech companies – not because they care about the communities they “serve,” but because communities object to the harmful effects of such enormous, energy- and water-intensive infrastructure built to support technology that most consumers “don’t care about.”
In fact, reports claim that approximately $64 billion in data center projects in the United States have been delayed or blocked by local bipartisan opposition. Microsoft is rumored to have canceled several billion-dollar data center projects. This evolution towards a responsible data center model is therefore not entirely surprising.
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