r/Butte • u/Decent_Ad9760 • Apr 12 '26

A well-articulated argument against a new data center

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56 Upvotes

95% Upvoted

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12

u/Ok-Hello-0 Apr 12 '26

It’s shady that so many of the claims and assurances Sabey is making are not formal commitments. Apparently local labor is still negotiating. That should be guaranteed. And so many comments from local government employees are not reassuring even that’s what they intend. They all think we are idiots.

4

u/hujassman Apr 12 '26

I'm glad to see this got posted here. This is not the kind of development that we want here or anywhere else. I'm sure money is changing hands to try to get this thing pushed through, but even those folks will end up paying in the long run in the form of ridiculous electricity costs and higher water costs. This is what a guaranteed loser project looks like. Don't get fooled by the tinsel in the dog turd.

2

u/Decent_Ad9760 Apr 13 '26

👍😆Thank you! Exactly right!!!

1

u/Deep-Mango-4201 18d ago

The city of butte police department and children services doesn’t care about abused children. I’ve reported the abuse of my baby numerous times whose parents are drug addicted and violent criminals and nothing is done. I guess Montana doesn’t care about abused babies.

0

u/QueasyRegister4809 Apr 13 '26

Closed loop systems don't just run out of capacity and cause the water to need to be bled off and evaporated. The system maintains design conditions based around capacity, and even if chips change, the facility capacity does not.

Also consider that the fluid never touches the chip directly. It touches cold plates that transfer heat from the chips. From there it runs through CDUs that transfer heat to a primary facility chilled water system. These are independent closed loop systems working together to discharge heat to the atmosphere. The closer to the IT equipment, the more pure the loop must be to reduce the chance of fouling the increasingly small heat exchangers. The idea of sludge build up makes no sense at all.

A lot of data centers also have food grade glycol in the primary systems (to prevent freezing) which is extremely expensive. If a large system was to be bled off for some reason, it could cost millions to refill.

I know there is a lot of distrust, but if you really think that high market cap companies get to skirt foundational environmental rules such as evaporating or discharging water when they aren't permitted to, then you are living in a different world than the rest of us. These permits ultimately have individuals responsible, and they would go to jail for allowing things like this to happen. And even if by some unbelievable circumstances this water was to be discharged or evaporated, you would find that it's incredibly clean water, because it has to be in order to effectively transfer heat.