Comment by simonw
6 months ago
Right, I think a data center produces a heck of a lot more economic and human value in a year - for a lot more people - than the same amount of water used for farming or golf.
6 months ago
Right, I think a data center produces a heck of a lot more economic and human value in a year - for a lot more people - than the same amount of water used for farming or golf.
you can make a strong argument for the greater necessity of farming for survival, but not for golf...
God forbid the public has an amenity.
I mean... Food is pretty important ...
Which is why the comparison in the amount of water usage matters.
Data centers in the USA use less than a fraction of a percent of the water that's used for agriculture.
I'll start worrying about competition with water for food production when that value goes up by a multiple of about 1000.
The water intensity of American food production would be substantially less if we gave up on frivolous things like beef, which requires water vastly out of proportion to its utility. If the water numbers for datacenters seem scary then the water use numbers for the average American's beef consumption is apocalyptic.
I appreciate that you feel this way, it’ll never happen.
The US will never give up on eating meat. Full stop.
For every vegan/vegetarian in the US there are probably 25 people that feed beef products to their pets on a daily basis.
7 replies →
Corn, potatoes and wheat are important maybe even oranges, but we could live with a lot less alfalfa and almonds.
Also a lot less meat in general. A huge part of our agriculture is feed to feed our food. We need some meat, but the current amount is excessive
> Corn, potatoes and wheat are important maybe even oranges, but we could live with a lot less alfalfa and almonds. Both alfalfa and almonds contain a lot of nutrients you dont find in large enough amounts (or at all) in corn and potatoes though. And alfalfa improves the soil but fixating nitrogen. Sure almonds require large amounts of water. Maybe alfalfa does as well? And of course it depends on if they are grown for human consumption or animal.