Can Data Centers Be Done Right?

I'll give this example all the time, somebody drops you off at a car max, and they say

"The world is your oyster pick whatever you want, you're probably going to pick the Ferrari."

“But if they say, "Hey, you have to cover the cost of your own car, you might pick the”

Ford Fiesta, and right now they're picking the Lamborghini off our dime, and it's time they pick the Ford Fiesta. They have to innovate." Hi, everyone, from New York Magazine in the box media podcast network. This is on with Kara Swisher, and I'm Kara Swisher.

Today we're talking about data centers, and we're talking about them a lot. I hope you will stick with it because it's a very long and involved series of interviews about what's happening in data centers, and I think it's well worth your time, because the five biggest hyperscalers that include Amazon, Google, and Microsoft are on track to spend roughly $1 trillion on AI infrastructure between 2025, and this year as part of an

accelerating AI boom driven by tech companies and investors, and supported by the White House. But a recent Gallup poll found seven in 10 Americans oppose constructing AI data centers in their local area. AI data centers have become a bipartisan political issue in light of growing concerns about

their impact on water, on air quality, on the power grid, and energy costs. My guests today are each dealing with the environmental political effects of data centers in different ways. Erin Rockovich is a veteran environmental activist and consumer advocate. She's best known for investigation and a contaminated water in Hinkley, California, and

the landmark legal victory for residents that inspired the film, Erin Rockovich. You should go watch it, it's so great. This year, Erin launched a map tracking the data center build out across the U.S. Logan Mitchell is a climate and air quality scientist and analyst for Utah Clean Energy. In addition to other research, she's calculated the emissions for the proposed stratus

data center in Box Elder County, Utah. Elena Schlossberg is the executive director of the Coalition of Protect Prince William County, a grassroots organization based in Northern Virginia that led the push against the sprawling data center project called Digital Gateway. And Andy Shore is the mayor of Lansing, Michigan.

He supported a proposal for what he called a sensible responsible data center project in downtown Lansing, from a company that emphasizes environmental sustainability. And it did not pass.

“It's really important to understand why this happened, even sensible ones are getting”

shot down.

And how do you do the right data center build out, which is somewhat critical to the future

of technology, and at the same time, are all of a sick of billionaires telling all of us what to do? I know I am, and I'm sure lots more people are. It's a bipartisan issue. It's really important.

And it's really at the core of democracy is why I'm interested. Data centers are a proxy for anger over tech, and I want to have a thoughtful discussion about why that is and what we can do. Our expert question today comes from Beth Macy, a reporter and author of books including "Dope Sick and Paper Girl," she's currently running for Congress in Virginia's six district

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want to try it? I would. What's the cost of being well?

And why are we so obsessed with it in the first place?

That's this week on Explained It To Me. Find episodes every Sunday wherever you get your podcasts. Aaron Logan, Elena, and Andy, thanks for coming on on. Great to be here. Thanks for having us.

“Thank you for having me on on, on on that's how we do it.”

There's a lot to get into, but I want to start with a very short answer from each of you. What was the moment when you knew data centers were becoming a national issue with political consequences and also a local issue. Aaron, you go first, then Logan, Elena, and Andy. So it began with me on a particular morning, maybe 15, 16 weeks ago, where I woke up and

I had 30 emails, individual emails from the same community out of Pennsylvania, talking about data centers. So many times 30 people from the same community reach out to me, I typically am like, "What's going on?" And it was data centers, and we honest with you, I'm like, I didn't know a whole lot about

the data centers. I knew some, so I decided to look into it. Seeing the person that I am, I have to see the big picture. So I thought, "Gosh, is this just one backyard and one city and one state?" So I created the map, the Brockabitch data center.com.

And the first day when it crashed twice because of submissions, I'm like, "Oh my gosh,

what's going on out there?"

“And it didn't take 72 hours for the map to populate very quickly with multiple reports coming”

in from every single state. That blew me away, and that's when I'm like, "Oh my God, what did I just stop into?" Right. And you hadn't been paying attention to Elon or the rest of what was happening in Tennessee or anything like that before that.

Yes, I had been watching that a little bit from completely a different perspective of its a community, and obviously the environmental contamination going on. Okay. All right, Logan? Yeah.

For me, it was, you know, I work at Utah Clean Energy, and I follow the energy sector and what's going on with how new resources are being built out. So I've been following the buildup of data centers for several years now, but things really changed in a fundamental way for me here in Utah with the announcement and kind of the public explosion of interest in the status data center.

There was proposed on the shores of the Great Salt Lake. That really upended everything. And all of the discussion about it just it turned into this wild experience. And so the governor was involved in one of the things that really struck me was there is a quote from one of the people there that said, "There's a lot of top down, followed

our culture here in Utah, but something fundamental has changed. It's torches and pitchforks out here." So that kind of sentiment really struck me, and it was like, wow, and now there's been

“some real political consequences from that, and I think we're still at the very beginning”

of that story. Great. Elaine. I'm a native Virginian, and we bought our dream ten acres here in the Royal Crescent, and we built our dream home.

We couldn't afford to pay anybody to do it. We did it ourselves, and I became very engaged in the Royal Crescent and land use. So I am by nature now, grassroots organizer, and 2014, for the first time, a transmission line project was going to cross my property, and when I realized it was for secretive Amazon data center campus, that had our local leader signing NDAs and our economic development

department. I was like, "Oh no, you are not." And so at my kitchen table where I'm sitting now, I formed a coalition to protect Prince Ren County, and in 2021, when the digital gateway, the largest project in the world was proposed, next to the Manacist National Battlet Club, on Howard Brown, and the head

waters of a regional drinking water supply, we knew something catastrophically is going to happen. We could tell that our democratically elected board was ignoring us, and what I said in a Zoom meeting like this to a data center organization was if QTS that had just been purchased by Blackstone and compassed persisted, the backlash would not just be against them, that

it would be against the entire industry. And so here we are. Here we are. Okay. Andy?

Now you are a public official, so. I am. I am. You know, it's a conversation that is newer for us. We certainly have had, you know, small data centers as redundancies, and we have insurance

companies. We have our state government.

They have big computer rooms that were redundancies, always called data centers.

There was never really a big deal.

much everything that I think that you all are talking about in terms of making them pay amongst many other things. And when it came out, it was, there were some people who wanted more details, but then about an hour and a quarter down the road from us, a hyper scale, was proposed in Celine Township.

“And that was when, you asked, when do we know that's when I knew?”

That's when, whoever said it, the the torches and pitchforks came out and it was, you know, no hyper scale. And then that brought into Lansing, no small scale, no nothing. So it had reverberations or things that were perfectly fine and done in the correct way. And we think so.

I mean, I think so. But certainly others would disagree, and I don't want to speak for others. But we think that we had done everything that, I mean, we were, they were paying for community benefits for what we call pennies for power, they were paying for all the infrastructure. They were building infrastructure, giving it to us.

We said, you know, on day one, we said, you will never get a tax incentive from us.

This was not AI, this was cloud-based. But again, like what you said, this is pitchforks and torches and people came here and said, we don't want to hear either, even if it's a small scale when we don't want to hear either. And it's done that we pay for it. So the anger had shifted.

I want to get into the disclosure as a public official that only it was just talking about in a second. But let's level set, hyper scale data centers facilities at house computing infrastructure for companies like Google and Microsoft, and existed as you noticed for 20 years. But the AI boom is led to accelerated investments in a new wave of data centers that are

much larger, looking to give us some context, how are AI data centers different in terms of size and resources they require and their environmental impact? I mean, what we're seeing now is a really fundamental difference in scale and the technology has changed and shifted. And so we've had data centers for a long time, cloud computing, you know, whatnot.

“But the amount of compute that you need to train these AI models is at a different magnitude.”

But really, you know, there's a fundamental difference in scale. And so there's two kinds of data centers, typically there's big training data centers and they have massive loads, they're incorporating all this information, huge, huge compute needs. But they don't necessarily need to be, have immense redundancy because they're training they're learning.

And then there's inference data centers where you need to have, you know, you tap in a chat on your phone or computer, it needs to respond really quickly. And those need to be really responsive, they typically need to be closer to populations centers wherever you're doing the queries from. And so there's two different kinds.

And it used to be that data centers were pretty small on the order of like 10 to maybe 50 megawatts of power consumption. And now we're starting to see hundreds of megawatts, even gigawatts of data centers being proposed. It's just a completely different order of magnitude at the size of these compute facilities.

And the energy consumption. And the larger footprint, correct, the larger, yeah. So Erin this year, as you noted, you launched the CrowdSource map tracking data center built out across the US, a common complaint you're hearing when there's not as lack of transparency around the projects.

And a recent New York Times investigation found that secret meetings and deals were essential

“to met as giant $50 billion high-perian data center in Louisiana, which I think was the”

verse that got a lot of attention. Talk about what's driving the secrecy around data center projects and how tech companies developers and local officials are able to keep these projects under wraps for so long. You know, that's an excellent question that everybody's asking, you know, there has not been, and I've taken in 16,000 submissions, each one of them states.

And these are multiple counties and cities in every single state that it was done under a shell corporation. It was done in total secrecy. They feel absolutely blindsided. They had no idea anything was coming at all. And this is across the board. And you know, I tend to follow the heart evidence from the people and on the ground and the data that they're reporting to me in the probability because that usually never lies. And so I was

astonished at the NDAs. And I've watched kind of an arc as this moves and we get deeper

and deeper into this, the water and the electricity was always there. But the NDAs, they

don't understand why they don't know how this happened when the public opposition showed up and Logan was talking about that. And that was one of the first real significant public oppositions that we saw out in Utah. And then the ground swell, everybody was showing up. We didn't have a seat at the table. How did it happen? Why the NDAs from your perspective? Why this, is it security? Is it that they don't competition? What is the excuse

thing? Especially the public officials? I think public opposition, I think that they just came in in the dark or the night like the people say and created these organizations.

upfront. But because you just kind of slid in, I think that was one way. It is like a gold

rush. And I don't know what their limited time frame is. But they had to do it that way to either protect themselves, get something through, which they knew they would not get through if the public knew. I mean, you're in Virginia, which has the most data centers in the world, I don't know people know that. But you mentioned this earlier, but last month, the court-ruling stopped

this massive digital gateway for moving ahead and Prince William County where you live. Considering Virginia is already the home to all these hundreds of data centers, dig down more in this project and your strategy for pushing back because it has welcomed data centers. It's been a big part of development there. Well, sure. I mean, we have this great, you know, incentives. The data centers don't

have to pay state tax. So the rest of us are paying the tax subsidy for them.

So the digital gateway was the first project after the Amazon campus was exposed. And

we fought to meet an energy. And we had our elective leaders actually start saying, they

“couldn't even say the word Amazon. That's how specific the NDA was. They couldn't even”

say the word Amazon. So the digital gateway was the first time we saw data centers moved outside of the overlay that we had created modeled after Laudon County. And what was shocking was that there was no concern about the amount of water. There was no disclosure. So while there is a lot of discussion about how much water I don't know how we can discuss it, they're not required to disclose it. So how do we know how much water they're using?

It's not just quantity. It's also quality. So when you build this kind of impervious surfaces, look and you'll understand this in a drinking water supply watershed. What you do is you limit the amount of groundwater recharge and then you have the surface

water runoff. And then you have the most important national park in the entire country.

And what is shocking is that there's also no disclosure about power. The part of the conversation that's been missed about what our biggest concern is, the risk to the grid. Just last week, we had an event where three gigawatts of power jumped off the grid because a data center, I don't know how many, removed themselves. So imagine you're on a sea saw and one of you jumps off. Well, what happens to the other one? The reality is that this industry,

the national risk is really what is happening to our grid. And that event on July 22nd, almost brought down an entire grid from Virginia to Chicago. What is happening is not just about in my backyard. What is happening is a risk to every single rate payer and every single person relies on affordable, reliable energy. And so the digital gateway is a microcosm of what is now happening across this entire country. And all the coalition works to do is expose

and demand transparency, oversight and accountability. And without that basic process implemented everywhere on a statewide and national level, every American is at risk. And it's not just about my backyard and my investment. It's about this country. Right. And your strategy is to get that idea out that it's not just, oh, it's that you have this nice farm in Virginia and you want to make sure your refrigerator doesn't go down.

“So Andy, as mayor, I think you have tried to be open, transparent about it, but you supported”

the construction of a data center in downtown Lansing, Michigan. It was proposed by Deep Green at UK-based company. The data center would have been for cloud storage, not AI, but the project, as you said, face public opposition is not moving forward. Talk about what you learned from the experience and you were trying to do it and what could be considered the right way and still ran into stumbling blocks. Because in a lot of ways, which I have

said this on my podcast many times, the data centers are proxy for anger over not just the abuse of power, the abuse of billionaires or getting what they want. It has to do with corruption that people feel and the worries about AI at the same time. So it's sort of become the vessel because it's a physical manifestation of those things. And the negative is some of the moral good to do right for economic development for your area in Lansing. What? And to address kind of some of the

things that have come up. You know, yes, there are concerns about water. We had those concerns in the beginning and we told them close loops. It's going to be closed loop. So they were using about the same amount of water as the Wendy's across the street was going to use. That was

“important to us. We didn't want them sucking out of the Grand River, which is, again, we didn't”

want them taken the water. Explain what a closer it was very briefly. They used the close loop system where they use in essence the same chemical. It's called glycol and they use that to power all of it. It's sealed close loop. glycol is the same chemical we use at our stadium for the beer distribution. So it's according to our folks that this is, it's this is a fairly easy chemical

battery plant way less. It was about the same as the fast food. So again, we wanted to make sure

“we were not taking water out of our aquifer, our power. The proposal was at the northern edge of our”

downtown in empty parking lots right across the street from our water treatment facility right

right by our highway. They had committed to our noise ordinance. They were basically urban infilling.

They were going to do art and murals and things like that. It was small. It was a 24 megawatt. So it was small. It was within the whoever said, you know, the 10 to 50. So there was a lot of that. I didn't sign an NDA. It wasn't asked to sign an NDA. The only reason I can think of that someone we wanted an NDA is if there's some kind of proprietary technology. But I did not get asked nor did I sign one. Now we do, when we do economic development, we work with businesses all the time.

I work with developers. I work with businesses. They come in with pretty crazy asks sometimes. And we narrow the down to what we think is right. And then we announce it to the public. We bring it to our economic development boards. We bring it to council and it gets full public vetting before

“it goes anywhere. And that's what happened here. We work with them. They wanted to be in our hard”

downtown. And we said no more because it was, it would become a dead spot. It's not an active retail. So to come a dead spot. So we told them go to our northern edge. Go into this empty parking lot.

We were to gotten a million dollars in return on equity. So yeah, we put a lot of requirements on

them. But the question that you asked originally, and I believe this to my core is that, you know, this was rejected here in Lansing, which is okay. That is exactly the political process. We think they're going to go to Indiana or Illinois who is going to have none of those requirements who are just going to take them in. So we think it's going to be a negative, a negative to the environment because we were going to put all these requirements on and others won't. So that's that's

my one of my bigger concerns. It's really important about the closed loop because it's actually it is a problem. It is. And the closed loop, it is not just you use it one in time. It has to be flushed. And when it is flushed, what happens is those chemicals that are used to clean all the the chips come through that. And if we haven't read about what's happening in Wyoming, a meta campus is responsible. They traced it back and you, I mean, you obviously know,

they traced it back to the meta campus. So the closed loop is not the panacea that it has been told. And my question is for the campus in Lansing. What is the backup generation? Every data center campus needs backup generation? What is that, Mayor? Our generation was going to be they were going to generate what they could from the fuel cell. And we had eight megawatts reserved for them. We have excess power because we have a municipal utility. And this city works

controls the municipality. It's not consumers. It's not DTE. So our utility had reserved an essence power for the max generation. We didn't think they were actually going to do 24 megawatts at, you know, naturally. We thought they would do again, 16, 18. But at a high peak, we had the power ready for them from the grid, which was available. Okay, we weren't going to,

“you know, they don't have backup diesel generators. That's what I mean. They don't have backup”

diesel generators. Okay. No, not at all. Nope. This was this was straight fuel cell non-combustion. We would not allow that. I didn't know what you were going with that. So sorry, we have not,

we didn't, it never even came up. Diesel generation never even came up. Right. Go ahead, Darren.

So on the closed loop, I'm really glad we're having this conversation. And a late exactly what you pointed out happen in Cheyenne is one issue with closed loop. But there's another and Logan might really want to jump in here. Because the closed loop system is kind of a paradox to the engineers. I call it kind of an illusion because if they don't have the open evaporation systems, which is where they're using more direct water, we go to the closed loop system,

which actually is going to end up consuming more water offsite because you need the electricity for all these closed loop systems. And now you've created a bigger problem. So there's two issues with the closed loop. But it's presented to people as oh, it's closed loop. You're going to be using less water. In actuality, you're going to be using more water offsite. You're going to need the Duke energies of the world. You're going to need the PG&E's of the world, the utilities, the nuclear,

the coal to provide all the electricity for these closed loop systems. One of the biggest misconceptions that that I found as the Stratostata Center conversation was starting to ramp up and reporters were getting really interested in trying to understand the issue is there's actually two water stories. One is the water of consumption of the data center itself, but then the other one is the water consumption of your energy generation. And usually folks, the data center

oh, it's closed loop. We're not using very much. Right. Let's ship, I was just about to shift to water. Data centers require vast amounts of water for what's known as evaporative cooling. A 2024 report found that most existing data centers use this method.

Logan, you estimated that Kevin O'Learies proposed Stratost Project in Utah would use 16.6 billion

gallons of water a year to operate the gas turbines. O'Leary recently said that he has prepared to significantly reduce the size of the proposed 40,000 acre project. Break down this water use for people understand and how to Stratost compare to other water intensive projects. And we know golf courses use too much water. We were aware of that in places like Utah where water is already scarce. So Logan, if you could go through that and full disclosure, I call Kevin O'Leary

“a moron almost on the daily. So just full disclosure. I think he's the greatest face you could have”

for this because that means none are ever going to get built. But you don't have to say that. I can say that. Logan, can you explain that? How big this is and break down the water use?

Yeah. So again, the Stratost data center proposal here in Utah has many of the similar elements.

Say, you know, is under the cover of night, we had this extra dynamic where we had this special quasi-governmental organization that was signing off on it. But when it came up and when it started to hit the public awareness, I started looking around for, oh, what is their plan? What are they actually planning to do? And there there was no details. It was the level of detail was we're going to build 100% natural gas, non-giggle-out data center, which is insanity. Because,

I mean, the entire state of Utah uses about four gigawatts total at our peak. So it's more than double what the entire state of Utah uses. So I just said, okay, well, if there's no details, I, you know, the people are screaming for details. They want to know, like, what is this actually mean? And so I said, okay, what are the two most common types of natural gas, power production? And there's two different dominant technologies. There's more out there. There's boutique technologies

that are getting deployed at small scale. But if you're looking at building a non-giggle-out data center, you're going to use whatever the dominant technologies are. So the first option is combined cycle turbines. Those are the most common kind of utility scale power generation. And they use evaporative cooling for the power generation. And that's, again, this is in addition to the data

“center itself. And that's what would take, if you were to build non-giggle-outs with combined”

cycle turbines, that's what would take 16 billion gallons of water. The problem with that is,

I mean, there's lots of problems with that. There's lots of trade-offs depending on what technology use. But there's such a rush to gas right now that those turbines are back ordered five to seven years. So they're not available right now. And so what's happening is all these data centers are pivoting to this other technology called reciprocating engines. And they basically look like a diesel locomotive powered by natural gas. I mean, some of them actually are diesel,

the backup generators are diesel, but they also make natural gas versions of these. They consume less water. It's still a non-giggle-out facility would take two billion gallons of water per year. But they emit tons, they're way less efficient in terms of the combustion. So they emit tons of nitrogen oxide pollution that contributes to ozone and particulate matter. And this was happening down in Tennessee. Exactly. And so there are real trade-offs there. And this is just the water

consumption from the power generation. This is in addition to, you know, whatever water consumption

“there would be from the actual data center campus. And I think one of the really big flashpoints”

in Utah is the location where they were planning to put this is right on the north shore of the great Salt Lake. And if you know anything about Utah, you know the great Salt Lake is having troubles. We're using too much water. And there's a major effort across the state. There's tons of awareness on reducing water consumption. Everybody farmers, cities, everyone's being asked to conserve water, you know, don't water your lawn. We're in a drought. We had the worst winter snowpack

as a function of climate change and natural weather variability. And so everyone's being asked to conserve water, especially in the great Salt Lake watershed. And then, you know, this data centers getting this kind of like free pass with these backdoor deals, going to consume a massive amount of water. And so that just really, really ignited. Periodic people. Yeah. We'll be back in a minute. Support for the show comes from groans. Summer can disrupt our routines with busy weekends

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in addition to loss of water pressure. Also on top of that, what is the sense of what's causing is and whether these effects are limited to the construction phase? That's a great question. So, you know, I've been watching the arc from proposal stage, which we've talked about and the main thing is the complete lack of transparency, and then all of a sudden construction starts. And it's during that construction phase that you start hearing from people, whether it's

I've got a trickle of water, whether I've had to redrill a well because my well water went too low, too turbidity. So depending on like if you have shallow water, you're going to get a lot of turbidity and discoloration. And so we're now during this construction phase, we're getting into the noise, the disruption, the water issues, the lack of water, consistent water, dirty water, water, you can't drink into electrical, they're getting power outages. It flickers on, flickers off to the huge,

huge disruption. And to watch it, it's almost like really violent. They're just destroying the trees, the habitat, and then all the way to up and running. And when they're up and running, this is where we hear so much about this 24/7 noise. So it's kind of an arc. And so during the construction phase, that's where you're starting to get so many reports of different water issues. So data centers require continuous power to operate for junior recently passed an energy consumption

tax's cap to $600 million a year, not sure why it's caped. How much of an impact do you think the tax will have on electricity costs in Virginia and Andy would something similar be effective in Michigan, Elina, you go first. So the tax really won't have much of an impact. What would have had an impact is had they removed the incentive. What will have an impact is a rate care pace right now before the S&C based on the Haymarket Transmission Life. I just want to

appreciate this conversation, but I really, I just want to interject one thing if you don't

if you don't mind please. So here's what people should be paying attention to here.

Virginia is your future. Why are we still fighting for Virginia? Because there's still plenty left to say, what is happening in Virginia is literally the Canary in the coal mine. We are running a 21st century industry off coal that's coming from transmission lines all the way from West Virginia and on days where there's too much stress on the grid, they are running on diesel generators and it's not about an envy. It's about a very basic principle of a democratic process that has

left us out. And instead of ensuring that we have clean air and clean water, we want to make sure that this industry can function no matter what the cost, right? So even even in your point being that even if you paid more, we shouldn't let them even pay more because it's not worth the cost. Here was the perspective of the coalition of why making them pay this particular cost allocation

was critical in 2016. If they have to pay for their own stuff, you better believe they'll innovate.

Because I give this example all the time, somebody drops you off at a car max and they say, the world is your oyster pick whatever you want and you're probably going to pick the Ferrari.

“But if they say, hey, you have to cover the cost of your own car, you might pick the Ford Fiesta”

and right now they're picking the Lamborghini off our dime and it's time they pick the Ford Fiesta. They have to innovate. You're making an excellent point. So you don't even think better, more taxes is what's needed. And can you respond to this? Do you think that having these energy consumption tax, you're saying, oh, and it's not good enough? And how do you respond to that? I mean, I think one of the biggest concerns that I hear is, you know, I don't want my rates to go up

for a business that is going to be making a lot of money. And again, we said that's not going to happen here, but certainly if they're going somewhere and there is a federal tax and it's, you know, but throughout the country, because right now we're getting picked apart state by state and that can reimburse consumers or pay consumer bills. I do think that would help to alleviate at least some of the concerns. Now, there are other concerns you've heard them here and I get that.

“I think their concerns that could be shared about a lot of different industries that”

put pollution into the air and into the water and focusing just on data centers, ignores a bigger part of what's going on. But I think that ensuring that people are not being required to pay more for an industry that can certainly pay their own. Again, when they came to us and said, you know, we want to talk about incentives, we said not a chance. You guys are cash rich. There's not a chance you're getting an incentive and you're going to pay

to make sure that our poorest folks are getting energy help, which is our pennies for power project. Let me bring Logan in. A recent Goldman Sachs commodities research report found that the US data center power demand is forecast more than double the 66 gigawatts in 2027 from 31 and 2025 put that energy use into perspective Logan and the stress it increases on the grid and aside from all these other deleterious effects. And in order to meet energy demand, some companies

have built on site power sources that are separate from public utilities for the Stratos project

in Utah. You calculate that a nine gigawatt natural gas power plant reduces around 35 million metric

tons of carbon emissions of year. And I'd love to understand the first question and then how significant is that Utah's air quality and emissions is a whole? Yeah, I mean, this is an enormous

“increase in electricity production if it comes to pass. And I think there's also a good possibility”

that this is a, we're in a hype cycle and the AI data center bubble will burst. As, you know, as soon as you put a dollar amount on compute efficiency, all of a sudden some clever engineer figures out to how to do something more efficient. You actually, it's actually funny. I've seen that number of articles back from the year 2000 when the internet was first blowing up and we thought, how we'd have all these, you know, internet servers everywhere. They're going to consume all

this power and then what happened? Energy efficiency was this massive push and we've actually been able to keep energy load growth through more efficient lighting, et cetera. You know, largely flat in this country for a long time, even as we've been growing. And so we did get all that bad social media stuff that made our girls feel bad. Right. But go ahead. Yeah, that's another, that's another

But if this logo does come to pass, that is an massive build out cycle for our energy system.

“Now, one piece of the conversation is our energy system needs to be upgraded. There are so many”

things that need investment. And so there's a possibility if this is done the right way with transparency with public input that, you know, these cash rich entities could make investments. And I'm talking about advanced transmission technologies like reusing the current right away to put advanced conductors that can put more energy through the lines. If they go through with this one, the quality there and the emissions are staggering for you. Yeah. Yeah. And to put in perspective,

you know, the entire state of Utah has like 65 million metric tons of this one facility with

increased Utah's total greenhouse gas emission total CO2 emissions by like 50%. Now, the other thing that isn't accounted in that is upstream natural gas leakage. Natural gas is not really natural. It's actually methane gas. Natural gas is about 95% methane and methane is a really potent greenhouse gas. It's about 80 times more potent than CO2 on a 20 year lifespan, which is what we all care about. And it turns out that there is an enormous amount of methane leakage in upstream oil and gas

production facilities in Utah and Wyoming. It's something like 5% of the gas that comes out of the ground just leaks into the air. Aaron, what were you going to say? Well, you know, Logan is talking about the huge load on one system. And if we're going to build out 1,200 to 1,400 or more of these across America, you're talking about a load that I do not believe are antiquated infrastructure can handle. So I participate in what are called this terrible. They're called the Prince William Energy Engagement

Group. They cannot reconductor. They were supposed to reconductor the massive transmission line that goes to the Benautic National Battlefield. And within one year, they said we cannot afford to have any planned outages on this line because it will bring down the system. Your transmission line infrastructure is like your highway. And right now that highway is clogged. And what we are building is an entire infrastructure for one industry. What happens when that industry innovates and we have

built out the trillions of dollars for the Benautic infrastructure that they don't need anymore? Who is the one responsible for that? We have to pause and we have to have a plan. And I'm just

“going to tell you, if you want to see your future, look at Virginia. They're not doing it any different”

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businesses have made this switch. So why not you? Try Odo for free at Odo.com. That's OdoO.com. We had an expert outside question every episode here is yours. I'm Beth Maysee. I'm a reporter and author who's running for Congress in Virginia's sixth district. Data centers have become a huge issue in my rural agricultural part of the state. In fact, opposition to them seems to be the only thing that's bringing Republicans and Democrats together lately. So I guess maybe that's a

healthy thing for our democracy. Many people from big tech, the business community and even some of our local governments say that data centers and AI are inevitable. So don't worry,

“everything will be fine, you let it. I disagree. I think we need guardrails about who pays for the”

utilities, the water usage, and the environmental impact of data centers, not to mention protection from the looming catastrophe that AI promises for our workforce. I think AI is going to make what NAFTA did to factory workers look like child's play. So I'm asking you guys, what kind of guardrails can we place against data centers and AI? What kind of federal legislation can protect our jobs, our young people, and our land and water from a handful of billionaire, cookie man babies,

who want to be trillionaires? I like Beth. What a great book she wrote. Erin, why don't you go first

line, it's a bigger issue than just this. But Erin, you start. Oh yeah, it's every issue and it's

“everyone's issue that's at stake. It's the water, it's the electrical grid, it's the cost of utilities,”

it's the noise, it's the air pollution, it's the loss of our land, our sanctuary. It just feels like a full-on assault and see at a local level, they're the ones in charge of zoning and permitting, is to have oversight. I know that states, we have 14 states that are now going to start looking at state legislation and oversight. And yes, federal, this is an absolute runaway train. And it is probably one of the biggest conversations that I've ever seen in my 30 years in my career.

That is political. It could be bipartisan. Everybody's going to have to be involved. I am perplexed, Cara. Why are leaders don't listen to the people? And there's a movement happening and a shift that I don't think these big tech companies or giants saw coming. Go ahead, Logan. Yeah, I mean, we need demand. We need data centers to have demand flexibilities so they're

not adding to our peak load at the most critical times. So now I'm putting additional stress

on the grid. They need to pay for their own infrastructure and they need to socialize and pay for upgrading the whole grid. It's really what they should be doing. And that if we really need it to be bringing around a clean energy and storage, this is an opportunity to actually build out and

“develop some of the emerging technologies. So in a great example of that, that's I think a major”

opportunity here in Utah is in and across the west is developing geothermal energy. And so, pairing solar with geothermal, there's enormous opportunities there. And we can have data centers help to drive down the cost so that energy type can, can displace other kind of firm generation. It can be clean firm generation, which our grid needs. And it has to be transparent reporting and public engagement. The Utah Foundation, it's one of the groups here in Utah that they do an

annual survey of voter priorities. In 2024, there are number two issue that they ranked was politicians ignoring voters. And this perfectly encapsulates politicians ignoring voters. This issue around data centers. And then the stratus was just like this massive example of that. And one of the big political fallouts here in Utah. I mean, politicians are not immune. Are the president of the Utah

state Senate lost his primary election? Yeah, well, I'll get to that in a second. Yeah, it's a political

earthquake. He's one of the most influential legislators here in Utah and it was not close. Andy, speak to that. Are you worried about your job? No, I just won reelection in November. And I knocked 10,000 doors. First let me say, I agree with the guardrails. You know, I've actually had conversations with the climate mayors and the sustainable cities coalition. And they've asked me, what are the guardrails you were able to get? And they've got documents that say, put these

guardrails on. It's everything you've heard. You know, water electric, making sure they pay for it, maintenance. We haven't even talked about maintenance, heat capture, customer benefit, things like that. That is absolutely, that should be on everybody's to do list. I don't care who you are. But, you know, I knocked 10,000 doors and you don't want to know what people want to hear about in Lansing and Michigan and in Michigan. Taxes are too high, costs are too high, roads stink and pot holes,

public safety and too many guns on the street. I got a few, you know, data center environmental. I did get a few of those. But when politicians listen to people, they listen to all of the things, all of the things. It's not just one thing. I can't just focus on one thing. And this is part of it. So when we said, you know, what we're doing with, you know, whether it's high manufacturing the new battery plant that just came in, auto manufacturing, the proposed data center, all of these

things we talk about benefit that's going to help out for taxation. So we don't have to raise taxes. We talk about building housing. We're building, you know, new housing units, affordable and regular market rate. So I disagree. I think politicians not everybody, right? Not everybody is the prince. But I think politicians do listen to constituents, but they have to make decisions. And when you talk about the studies, you know, I tell everybody this, politicians are public

“officials or what a mayor, you have to make decisions. We are decision makers. And when you decide”

for somebody, they're like, of course you did. I'm right. And when you decide against somebody, they say, you suck and you're not listening to me. So we really lose no matter what. But that's the job. The job is to listen to people and then make a decision for what you think is best for your community. And you know what? If you tell enough people that they're wrong, they're going to vote you out of office. So that's, I mean, that's politics. And they're doing that.

a few places where they are. But I can point to a lot of places where they're not. And that

is the same system we have always had. All right, Elena. So let me just share a whole story.

Very quickly, when this fight began in 2014, I was on the General Assembly floor with the most socially conservative Republican in the entire, you know, delegation. And and somebody said, oh my god, hell has frozen over Bob Marshall and Elena Schlossberger hugging. And let me tell you, as much as this industry is tearing communities apart, it is also bringing people together at a time when things have never been more tribal or toxic between the two parties. And that has been

our superpower. And as far as decision makers, I have had a Board of Supervisors sitting in front of me and say, I'm the decision maker. She didn't care about the facts. She didn't care about the science. She didn't care about the risk to the grid. She didn't care about the overall impacts of what was happening. And in my community, you can't get elected unless you are on the right side of this issue. Because it's not just about an envy. I say this all the time. I told me

this one quote before. If I am not for myself, who am I? If I am only for me, who am I? And if not now, then when this fight is everything. It's about every single conservation easement in the state of Virginia. It's about transmission lines. It's about dirty, diesel generators. It's about

“whole. It's about everything people care about. Which I think is true. But I think the mayor has”

a point. People are also concerned about this and this, like the ability to be nuanced has been lost in our society. When you're in a utility bills are doubling and you're in one of those communities, that is a demographic that can't afford it. You suddenly care because now your utility bills is expensive as your rent or your mortgage. Yes. I would agree. In June, Republican primaries in Box Elder County, which I think was what you're referring to. Some post-stratus data

center candidates, lots of elections, also shaping out to be a national issue in the mid-terms. At the same time, opposition is sometimes characterized as you said as hyperlocal, the NIMB driven. What's interesting to me is the point you made about the tech companies don't know. I've had meetings with all of them. Well, I wrote a book called "Burn Book," which was

somewhat critical of them. Very critical. And they thought it was too mean. And when I went to

“see them, I said, I don't think it's mean enough. I think people hate you. Like, I think you're”

going to see a hatred growing towards you. And they're like, "They don't hate us." And like, "No, they hate you." And you'll see as more and more happens. And what was interesting is just recently, suddenly a lot of these tech companies have called me and it looks like you're right about them hating us. I was like, "Now they hate you more." Like, I don't know what to tell you because you've done so many horrible things. But talk about when they try to blame it on NIMBism or what's

happening here. Maybe each of you talk about how it's affected politics. And by the way, it's against the backdrop of President Trump signing an executive order to speed up federal approvals for AI data centers and energy infrastructure. And the energy department announced last week, the Trump administration is repurposing federal land to host massive data centers. So that's happening. What do you start giving the federal government's efforts to accelerate it to what extent

can you reign it in? And then the others can comment on that. In terms of reigning it in,

“again, I think we can set local conditions. But not if they put it on a federal land.”

I mean, zoning generally gets left to locals with local citizens being able to make that decision at a planning commission meeting, which is made up of citizens that are appointed or elected. So I think that that's, I think, remaining a local decision where you can throw out your mayor and council members for whatever decision they make. You have recall, one of the things that concerns me and you know about this is the Trump administration is proposing putting federal bureaucrats

in charge of making decisions at the federal level for grants and other things like that without

actually looking at the actual science or the conditions. And I've been pretty critical of that.

I think leaving it local. But you know, and I know you had asked kind of what's the what's the impact. I think that I honestly think that those that care that have made this theirs their issue have formed a block and I've seen a ton of that. So Lina and Erin first, um, if Trump is going to give away federal lands to do this, there is no stopping it for now at least. So let me just practice this with actually let's make this very clear. It is a bipartisan issue both on the

side of responsible development and oversight and irresponsible. It doesn't matter whether you're blue or red. I see it in both ways. President Biden on his way out the door was the first one to pass an executive order to allow federal lands to have data center infrastructure. And so what President Trump did was he just simply like, "I mean, let that on fire." Right now, in Prince Rand County region of headline, Prince William Force National Park, Lance Walk considered for data

impress upon the secretary of the interior that if this happens, you will start to see, I think,

such a backlash against Republicans. That is more than what is happening out because this issue unites everyone and it does matter. You know, fighting data centers and talking about energy and water and grid infrastructure, let me tell you not the sexiest thing. But when it comes to your utility bills, it really matters. This, as much as it has risk democracy, let me tell you something democracy is what is saving us right now. It is people coming together using their voices to

“expose the rot and not caring if it's their own party. And we, we talked about oversight. I think”

that was the question. In the state of Virginia, in January, we have a very truncated session. And for this will be year number five, we go, we ask for legislation last year. We've got some through. It's about transparency. It's about accountability. It's about regulation. And it's about holding them accountable. There are ways on a state-wide level. And we're going to continue to try again. Okay. All right. So Aaron, very quickly on, if the feds put them on these lands.

Well, it's, it's very concerning and you are starting to see that happen. And I do know, we probably all do that Senator Sanders is definitely looking at more federal oversight. And I don't know if that kind of, if we can get some of that past could slow back, Trump's decision on federal lands, but it gets pretty dicey. And Andy said it, this is very much local issues, very much state

“issues. And it is concerning that federally Trump would just come in and take over those lands.”

So it's, and it is, it's a bipartisan issue. And, you know, Elena is correct. There's going to, there's going to be some type of backlash here politically. And I hear it state by state, Texas is

really chiming up out there that this is going to be enough game changer for people to switch

parties. Okay. So I'm going to end on talking about data centers done right, because they're going to come, this is going to happen. They're going to have some of them, but how to do it correctly. I'd like to end on a research report from Brookings Institute, argues that data centers can become sustainable engines of local economic growth. But only if communities move away from development model defined by, quote, speedy deal making and opaque negotiations, which we've been talking

about here. Open AI has a proposal for so-called AI economic zones that are, quote, created by local state and federal government together with industry that significantly speed up the permitting processes for building AI infrastructure like new solar arrays, wind farms, and nuclear reactors. I know Sam Altman's particularly interested in nuclear reactors. Kevin O'Leary has said, quote, sustainability is at the heart of what we do in terms of these proposals, which is not

accurate. But talk about what has to happen here, where a data center is a genuine value ad for the people who live there. I'd like each of you to address it in any of these ideas, whether it's open AI economic zones, or using nuclear, or if you had to be pushed and say, okay, we're going to have a data center. If you were running the show, each of you, what would you foresee, and you could foresee in the future, too, like it doesn't have to be what exists at this point.

Let's start with you, Logan, and then Andy and Elena and Aaron. Yeah, I mean, this is what we've been trying to communicate to folks. Like, let's have a positive vision for how to do this responsibly. If data centers are done responsibly, and they actually pay further on infrastructure and help to actually drive down costs of the infrastructure for other folks, you could actually see energy, electricity costs coming down because you're having a big load that's helping to pay

for a lot of the costs that are usually socialized across rate pairs. And so, it is possible, but you need people who are rate-paired defenders, who are engaged with the public service commission, understand these issues and understand how to structure the tariffs so that data centers pay their fairway, or more than their fairway. And that has to be demand flexibility. Often, our grid is built to supply energy at the peak times. Whenever one's turning on

“their recognition room when it's the hottest out, right? And you have to have enough capacity to”

serve those, and it's really just like 10 to 20 hours a year that our energy spikes up to the be the highest level, and that drives an enormous amount of costs. So, if they can just turn off curtail their load during just a few hours of the year, they can actually not add to the peak load that our grid has to serve, which is a big driver of cost. And again, this is an opportunity to build new synergy. There's a lot of discussion about nuclear. It's interesting because, you know,

it is a carbon-free form of energy. There's a lot of health concerns with it. We still haven't

dealt with the waste. But the biggest problem with nuclear energy is it's always a decade out,

a distraction for other technologies that we have available today, which is wind solar batteries in geothermal. And geothermal specifically fills the same kind of clean-firm generation profile that nuclear would. And we're seeing some of the very first next generation geothermal products are coming online this year, actually in a few months here in Utah, and that'll be a few more in the West. And so, it's really exciting time. People should be talking about geothermal, and nuclear is just

“really not a part of the equation, because it's not economic, and it's not timely. All right, Andy?”

I mean, I think I've talked quite a bit about kind of the list that we've come up with, but

we've talked about water and making sure water is preserved. I live in Michigan, right, 20 percent

of the fresh water in the world is right here in the Midwest and the Great Lakes. You know, again, I love the closed loop system, but I hear the issues, so I think that needs to be part of the conversation, contributions to low-income energy programs. Again, if they're going to come in and they're going to do this, we're going to make sure that people not only aren't being affected, but more people can afford to live. So I love that. You know, they have to pay

to build it. Again, if they're calf-rich, they have to pay to build it. In our case, they're going to pay to build it and then give it to us to operate for me, local decisions. The locals want to operate it if they want the company to operate it. No incentives, and I hold to that, you know, they don't need them. And I don't think that we should be giving them, you know, urban, zoning and location, you know, location. Again, we wanted to put ours in the northern part of

the downtown, people didn't like that, and they got their way, and that's okay. But it's also industrial by right. We have an auto plant that closed in 2006. They may go there, which is the

“natural place for them to go. You know, we're on a farmland, so I can't comment on that. But I think”

there's a system that can be set up because, again, I think we're going to have them. I think there is a demand, and you'll say, we'll get to it for AI. I mean, when we have people come in and tell us the evils of AI, reading it from the AI on their phone, there's a hypocrisy there. So you have to figure out what you need and how you get there. Right, Elena. So I'll just, I look at this and I reverse the equation. And the equation is not how to we need this low demand. It is how

they demand less. Here's what a good AI data center build that looks like. They're not relying

on coal. They're not relying on diesel generators. They're not relying on gas turbines. They don't need all the chillers on top because then we two remain so cool. I mean, because that's really what this is all about. Is they're cooling? It healthy data center build out is less. Because I'll tell you were campus 4 miles down the roads from the added intersection, 138 acres to campus this combined is about 1,000 megawatts, which is 1 gigawatts. That's enough for 1 nuclear reactor.

The scale and cumulative impacts are beyond anything. It is unprecedented and we need to slow down to understand that the, you know, the cart before the horse. I mean, that cart is like miles ahead. That's a really good point, Erin. I'm laughing Elena because that's exactly what I was going to say. This conversation and everybody's points are spot on, but it's difficult to have because the horse has left the barn. And this is precisely, you know, I will talk about the corporations here.

And I have seen them do this for 30 years over and over again, expecting the same result.

You'd never put safety and infrastructure on the upfront. You're always running something down the line

for the money to be the first to be the best to make more money. And if you would reverse that business model and do safety and infrastructure on the upfront before you let the horse out of the gate, you'll still yield the profit, but your long-term yields would be so much greater. And everybody that has been here today, I've loved this conversation. I could do this all day long. It's points are well taken. And the horse has left the barn and it's going to be very hard

to get it back. And I do think that this time it's going to take local council is going to

“state, take state. It's going to take federal, but something that I think we have been missing for a”

long time is going to be a huge part of this change in conversation and how you get that horse back in the barn, if you can, and how you move forward is going to be coming from the people. So this is my last question. Data centers obviously wrapped up as Andy noted in a broader AI backlash. And for many people, as I noted, it feels like a facilities in the tech, they knew what being forced upon them. And I'd like to know from each of you what's the most

more broadly. And tech, I think the tech people have done it to themselves, which, you know, one of you, when you said safety, I had a line in my book saying how can you understand safety if you

never felt unsafe a day in your life? These are people who create things who aren't in safe and

then wonder why people of color or women are upset. This is about social media because they never feel unsafe. The broad public opinion is very clear on this. And especially with young people around AI overall, and now data centers is another manifestation of that. At some level, it does cross over into probably not great for our future, right, to not to be part of the building things in industries. Probably these discussions happened around railroads and cars and everything else.

We've had this before and as you note, Aaron correctly, these companies never change. It's just the type of company it is. It's the same people doing the same nonsense. It's the most important thing that needs to happen to change public opinion on the topic.

And so, I'd like first Elena and then Andy Logan and Aaron, you get the last word on.

What could be done to change the public's attitude? Because right now, it's deeply negative, I would say. And it should be somewhere in the middle presumably.

“I don't know. I fancy a great question. I wouldn't presume that it should be. I think that”

there is a place for technology. And right now, it's like we're at Caligula's drunken fast. And everybody is partaking with no thought of consequences. And so, I believe I trust people. First of all, we're smelling it, we're feeling it, we're seeing it, we're tasting it. Something is broken. And I see it with my kids who actually reject a lot of the AI swap mine too. And I think that one has to happen is a more mature conversation, which, you know,

is not happening right now. So, I actually, I think that the conversation, the difficult conversation that's happening now needs to happen. And if it's uncomfortable, good. That's a really good point. Okay, Andy, next. Sure. You know, I think Cara, you made some good points that this has happened before. And I think a lot of that knowing my history is unchecked commerce, right? So, what do we do in the past? We didn't just suddenly trust the auto industry.

We didn't just suddenly trust manufacturing. We said five day work week. We said occupational safety standards. We said, you know, these are things that for us in a union state created the unions. These are the important pieces that got us to this is a positive because it's jobs and people are

“getting paid and the cars are coming. And I think that's what we've been talking about is, you know,”

what are the guardrails? What are the guardrails to make sure that we can have this tool that I do think is going to be part of the future, but have it responsibly. And to all that being said, what does that mean? It means you got to build trust. And I think you're hearing this here from Malena and Aaron and Logan and you and there is not trust. And I think you and I talked about this, you asked me to people not trust the local government. And I said, I think they do trust the local

government. They don't trust the companies to do what they're promising. So, I think it's building trust and how do you build trust, care it in the stick? You know, the care it is, you tell them, this is what you have to do for people to trust you. And the stick is these are the guardrails. And you will comply with these guardrails or you won't have a business and somebody else will comply with the guardrails. And they will win the day. And you would ask, you know, before what's the

rush, these folks are all telling local governments that they want to be up in 18 months because the AI race is going to be over in 18 months. So, you got to build guardrails. You got to do it with

“trust. And I think that would result in getting us the technology that we need as we move forward.”

That's a really good point, Logan. Yeah. So, I mean, I think what's happening, one of the one of the dynamics is happening right now is with this current administration. It is really a a smash and grab kind of environment. I call it a point-operated presidency, but go ahead. Right, right, exactly. And that is going to lead to a massive backlash because it's destroying the social compact. And these companies, if they're smart, they need to figure out how to regain

the public's trust. And really to do that, we need policy regularity. And really, I think the

name of the game, kind of the key point is clear, fair rules aren't the enemy of growth.

They protect responsible growth. And it's bringing the public into the conversation, making sure we can move forward together. And let's we're doing that. We're going to have all of this conflict. And it's just going to blow up in our face because we have a democracy. And that's the way it works. And it's not going to turn out well until we can get back to clear, fair rules. Yeah. Erin, you get the last word. Well, everybody brings up such great points. And listening

And the people suddenly become the gladiators. And for all the forward progress we make,

we're going to realize there's some things in the Flintstone days that we just can't do with that. And that's jeopardizing our natural resources, our health, and our welfare.

“And I think a lot of this will begin right at home and teaching kids about AI.”

So it's going to be a balance that happens in the home. It needs to be a balance that will happen

politically. It will be a conversation. And just this push-up, be all almost takeover of a country

and believe me, this is not only here in America, this is a global issue. I have 10 countries reaching out now. So if ever there's been a moment where we can collectively come together on something who knew data centers might be the one thing that united us all. Interestingly, I think you're a somewhat effective when they start talking about data centers in space.

That's like I'm just leaving. And we're like, "Go. Good for you. Godspeed."

And it's a frustrating conversation. There are other options and there are other solutions. And we have clearly discussed that. And why we have to do it this way. Maybe this will be the last time we learn the lesson, but I don't think so. I don't think so either. Anyway, I just did a recent series about medical stuff, about longevity. And some of the AI stuff is going to be groundbreaking. And so it is.

“Absolutely. That's what we have to focus on. The stuff that is”

useful for everyone versus just a small group of people who just want to become returned, stuff like that. Yeah, this has been an incredibly thoughtful conversation. I really appreciate it. And I'm glad we had the time to sort of debate different things and talk it out. And it's an ongoing issue. And so we'll have you back and maybe next year to see where we are. It's a great conversation. I enjoyed meeting everyone. Thank you so much.

Me too. Thank you, everyone, for being so thoughtful. Thank you. Thanks, everybody.

“Come on out to Lansing any time. Lansing, that's my next trip.”

Thank you guys so much for doing this. Today's show was produced by Nishat Kourwah, Michelle Aloy, Catherine Mealsop, Megan Bernie, Madeline Leplant, Dooby, and Katelyn Lynch. Special thanks to Dave Shaw, Andrea Lopez, Crisato, and Julia Sharp Levine. Our engineers are Fernando Aruta and Rekwann and our theme music is by Tracodemix.

If you're already following the show, you're getting a solar powered aesthetically pleasing data center in your backyard. If not, we're sending you to Elon's data center in space. Go wherever you listen to podcasts search for on with KerasWisher and hit follow. Thanks for listening to on with KerasWisher from Cody and Media New York Magazine, the Vox Media Podcast Network, and us. We'll be back on Monday with more.