Comment by throwaway2037
13 days ago
You raise an interesting point. If we look at Mag7: Alphabet/Google, Amazon, Apple, Meta/Facebook, Microsoft, NVIDIA, Tesla: All of they are probably building data centers at a furious pace. (Honestly, I'm not sure if NVIDIA needs as many as the other six.) However, we do not see great opposition to their own data centers. Why? My guess: They are incredibly careful about how they plan data center expansion to reduce brand impact. Most of the opposition seems to be directed towards (1) pure play data center builders/operators who are mostly B2B and don't care as much about their brand retail reputation (2) pure AI/LLM companies, like OpenAI and Anthropic. About (2): I wonder is the pushback deeper than the data center environmental impact and more about pushback against the unknown: "The Singularity with take all of our jobs.", etc.
Hmm, I'm not quite sure people are being discriminating about which data centers they oppose. I recall Microsoft and Amazon making a lot of concessions to get some of their sites approved.
I do agree though that despite what reasons citizens may be citing in public -- power bills, water, pollution, noise -- the real pushback is against the "AI will take our jobs" fear. To be fair, it's not just an abstract fear for a number of people already.
Yes, that is exactly what I meant when I wrote: "My guess: They are incredibly careful about how they plan data center expansion to reduce brand impact." Most large construction projects and buildings/factories require "lot of concessions". It is a fact of life in a modern democracy.