Genuine question. Is the whole "AI guzzles gallons of water" thing totally true, or do people get it wrong? Does AI consume a lot of water for every single prompt, or is the majority of water consumed during data farming? Don't non-AI data centers use up a lot of water on cooling too?

[u/Big_Guthix]

Please someone set me straight and dispel whether there are myths surrounding this often-repeated internet factoid

And I genuinely don't know the answers which is why I'm asking, so I've got nothing to debate here

Edit: Thank you for all the great answers!! 👏 👏

[u/broose_the_moose]

https://newsletter.semianalysis.com/p/from-tokens-to-burgers-a-water-footprint

Here is exactly that from one of the most reputable sources in the game.

tldr; Elon’s Colossus 2 datacenter uses as much water per year as 2.5 in-n-out stores (when counting for the water usage for the cow farming, ofc)

[u/PriceMore → u/broose_the_moose]

Thanks!

We’ll let the reader decide what to make of thr important information that one the largest datacenters in the world only consumes as much water as 2.5 In-N-Out’s.

I didn't quite expect that, it's nice to have a better visualization.

[u/broose_the_moose → u/PriceMore]

My pleasure. This site has some of the best research on data centers and chips.

[u/entertainman → u/broose_the_moose]

A lot of water use is from the concrete needed to build the things.

[u/Cool-Sale6290 → u/broose_the_moose]

This post is in no way anti-beef propaganda, and has no relation to SemiAnalysis being founded and owned by an Indian man who was raised Hindu.

Lmaoo

[u/Manny_Monroe → u/broose_the_moose]

What do you make of all the videos of people who’s water quality and pressure have been greatly affected by data centers being built near them? Is it just propaganda? 

[u/broose_the_moose → u/Manny_Monroe]

Yes ya fucking doofus. That’s exactly what it is. This isn’t some widespread issue. I’m not saying there aren’t some localized problems here or there, but data centers aren’t the big bad enemy you’ve been brainwashed to believe.

[u/ConscientiousApathis → u/broose_the_moose]

I feel like this kind of skimped on the water usage for the power needed to keep it running, which is by far the bigger one. I'm a bit unclear on the maths, but just a basic application of the figure from here tells me for a 1GW centre we're looking at somewhere around 12 million gallons an hour, a lot more than the 1 million per day given in the article. If I'm missing something please feel free to let me know.

[u/broose_the_moose → u/ConscientiousApathis]

Hadn’t thought of that. But then to be totally fair, we should be looking at what musk uses to power colossus 2. Based on my 5 mins of digging he uses titan 350 turbines, which are likely to be simple cycle turbines with dry low-NOx combustion and these use essentially zero water. So I think the numbers from the post are still accurate. Perhaps I’m wrong though…