What Are We Building AI For?

This just in with data centers: Energy grids are strained, water is scarce, utility costs are through the roof — ah well, let them eat compute, I guess!

More like this: AI Thirst in a Water-Scarce World w/ Julie McCarthy

It was just climate week in NYC and we did a live show on data centers with four amazing guests from around the US…

Thank you to the Luminate Foundation for sponsoring this live show and for all of our NY-based friends, and network from around the world that made it to Brooklyn for a magical evening. You can also watch the live recording on Youtube.

• KeShaun Pearson (Memphis Community Against Pollution) will break down how Elon Musk’s xAI supercomputer is polluting the air of historically Black neighborhoods in Memphis, and how organizers are fighting back against yet another chapter of corporate extraction in their communities.
• KD Minor (Alliance for Affordable Energy) will demystify the energy impacts of data centers in Louisiana and share organizing strategies to mobilize community opposition to Big Tech and Big Oil infrastructure.
• Marisol (No Desert Data Center) will talk about their grassroots coalition’s recent win in Tucson to stop Amazon’s Project Blue data center proposal, which threatened the city’s scarce water supply, and how they’re organizing for future protections.
• Amba Kak (AI Now Institute) will talk us through the bigger picture: what’s behind Big Tech’s AI data center expansion, who stands to benefit from this boom, and what we sacrifice in return.

Further reading & resources:

• Amazon Web Services is company behind Tucson’s Project Blue, according to 2023 county memo — from Luminaria
• Tuscon to create new policies around NDAs following the councils regret around not knowing more about Project Blue — from Luminaria
• How Marana, also in the Tuscon area, employed an ordinance to regulate water usage after learning about data center interest in the area.
• xAI has requested an additional 150MGW of power for Colossus in Memphis, bring it to a total of 300MGW
• Time reports on increase in nitrogen dioxide pollution around Memphis due to xAI turbines
• Keshaun and Justin Pearson on Democracy Now discussing xAI’s human rights violations
• Meta’s Mega Data Center Could Strain Louisiana’s Grid — and Entergy Isn’t Prepared — report by the Alliance for Affordable Energy
• 'A Black Hole of Energy Use': Meta's Massive AI Data Center Is Stressing Out a Louisiana Community — 404 Media

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