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> Livestock: ~730 billion gal This is a good illustration how cursed the datacenter topic has become when people go out of their minds on computer cooling whil

> Livestock: ~730 billion gal This is a good illustration how cursed the datacenter topic has become when people go out of their minds on computer cooling while continuing to eat meat which lets be perfectly clear - is mostly for entertainment purposes. I had someone berate me for defending datacenter water use and their last post was literally a cheese burger.

zug_zug 24d ago
Well the thing with the livestock is that you have to give a cow water. Datacenters do not need water. It is just slightly cheaper for them than cooling with electricity. Datacenters should be required by law to pay to build adequate power generation and infrastructure to pay for their consumption, and ideally in a way where it isn't a ghastly eyesore.
- jp191919 24d ago
  We do not need meat.
  - LaSombra 24d ago
    We do not need more datacenters as well.
  - zug_zug 24d ago
    Datacenters have a readily available substitute to water if they just make less profit. I'm not giving up my meat so that datacenters can use it for cooling, if that's what you're suggesting.
    - raincole 24d ago
      So? Many people are not willing to give up their cloud services either? And there are other kinds of meat that cost less water to produce. I don't think someone who isn't willing to give up beef for chicken is at a higher moral ground than someone who wants cheap tokens.
    - chneu 24d ago
      Give up your meat consumption because it's more about societal excess than anything else. Meat is and mostly always has been(in euro societies) a luxury item meant mostly for the rich. Capitalism turned meat into a MUST HAVE item for keeping up with the Joneses. We consume absolute insane amounts of meat nowadays, and we waste about half of it, just so people can feel good cuz theyre eating a high class excess meal. Lol most people throughout history didn't eat much meat. It's wild how modern western people refuse to see how we'll destroy the planet trying to feed 8 billion people with the most inefficient method of creating calories(beef). The inefficiency IS THE POINT.
    - ben_w 24d ago
      From the above stats, a 2.3% change to USA meat consumption, up or down, has the same impact as a 100% change to data centre water consumption, up or down. If I read the USDA stats correctly, US red meat and poultry production went up about 5.6% from Jan-Jun 2025 to Jan-Jun 2026, i.e. the increased production of meat led to an increase in water use that was twice as much as the water use of all the data centres combined.
      - atmavatar 24d ago
        It's not quite that simple. Most people who reduce/eliminate meat consumption are going to substitute something else rather than eat less, and what they substitute may be just as water intensive as the meat they replace. For example, if a person's meat diet is virtually all chicken (reasonable given prices lately), substituting the chicken for almonds is a net neutral change. Almonds use every bit as much water as chickens do. Granted, that may be an extreme example, as almonds are one of the more water-intensive crops, and chicken is one of the most water-efficient meats. There will likely be decent water savings in many cases, but at the very least, anything a person substitutes for their existing meat diet is going to use some water as well.
  - lightedman 24d ago
    In fact many humans need meat because the proper plant protein simply cannot grow/exist in their area. This is why we evolved to be omnivores. Basic biology laughs at your poorly-researched position.
    - jp191919 24d ago
      I'm referring to the majority of the population that lives in modern developed areas.
  - ghunio 24d ago
    True. I was going to hate the environmental destruction being wrought for the purpose of funneling more of our wealth to a handful billionaires who will use the AI against us, but then I remembered how bad meat eaters are for the plight of the common man, and now data centers don’t seem so bad after all.
- Ajedi32 24d ago
  You don't need a law to force people to pay for resources they consume; basic economics already ensures that. If there are externalities not already accounted for by that (increased demand for water/electricity driving up costs for others, noise, "eyesores", etc.) you could pass laws to ensure those costs are paid by the responsible party but that's not a datacenter-specific issue.
  - zug_zug 24d ago
    Don't quote theoretical econ idealism at us when our actual electricity rates are going up 20% or more per year. Increased demand absolutely DOES increase the cost both in theory and practice.
    - Ajedi32 24d ago
      I... agree? Did you even read the comment you replied to?
  - skinfaxi 24d ago
    How does that work in a market where you are bidding amongst other participants and capacity is constrained? Supply is limited and demand is growing, the market response is to charge more.
    - Ajedi32 24d ago
      Well, just off the top of my head... if you wanted to treat the increased prices caused by the spike in demand as an externality (and I agree that's not exactly the right way to think of it, but people seem determined to in this case and I can't really fault them for that given the practical effects of such price increases) I think the way to do that would be to give existing consumers futures contracts for water for the next ~10 years proportional to their existing usage. People could then either use the futures contracts to keep the price they pay for water the same as it was, or voluntarily reduce their water usage and sell the contracts to the datacenter for a profit. Same deal for power. This would of course be a bit complicated for most people to manage, so maybe instead of giving consumers the contracts directly you could have some intermediary manage the contracts for them with approximately the same result.
- wraptile 24d ago
  > Well the thing with the livestock is that you have to give a cow water. you don't _need_ a cow though
  - chneu 24d ago
    Exactly. You also don't need to grow acres of grass in the desert to feed the cow, but we do that too. Most folks have highly distorted views of how animal agriculture works. It's disgusting and insanely inefficient.
  - LaSombra 24d ago
    As you don't _need_ a datacenter as well
- citrin_ru 24d ago
  > Datacenters do not need water. It is just slightly cheaper for them than cooling with electricity. As long as electricity at least partially produced using fossil fuel I would prefer data-centers to use as little electricity as possible. There are regions which are getting plenty of rainfall on average (which can be collected and stored) or were getting some water from rivers will have negligible ecological impact. But currently DC operators have little incentives to choose DC location based on outdoor temperature or water availability and there are plenty of DCs in hot and arid regions.
  - jandrewrogers 24d ago
    > there are plenty of DCs in hot and arid regions Differences in air temperature are largely below the noise floor in terms of impact on data center cost. Slightly lower energy prices and other operational or capital costs are more than enough to offset significantly hotter climate. Arid climates improve evaporative cooling efficiency.
- ben_w 24d ago
  While I agree fully with this part: > Datacenters should be required by law to pay to build adequate power generation and infrastructure to pay for their consumption, and ideally in a way where it isn't a ghastly eyesore. Fact is, almost nobody "needs" meat in their diet, and even if all meat eaters did actually need it rather than merely want it, there are meats which use less than the average quantity of water. From the above stats, the mean American's loss of water due to unnecessary use of water for unnecessary meat raised in their territory, is about 43 times the mean American's loss of water due to the unnecessary water use of datacenters that are in their territory.
- wraptile 24d ago
  > Datacenters should be required by law to pay to build adequate power generation and infrastructure to pay for their consumption I think we can all agree on this one yet this is not what's being argued in most discussions. What hangs up the discussion is the complexity of development e.g.: to build a datacenter it takes 1 year but to build energy infra it takes 5. So this complexity needs equally complex policy and people just don't have time for that when there's free range raging served right to your palm screen.
thawawaycold 24d ago
yeah people should just accept starting to feed on AI slop for sustenance instead of actual food! How dare they have a preference
- wraptile 24d ago
  calling it "actual food" is clearly misleading when majority of meat is used purely for entertainment not for survival sustenance. By that logic compute is "actual medicine" because some of compute is used for medicine?
  - thawawaycold 24d ago
    > majority of meat is used purely for entertainment Source of that inane statement?
KennyBlanken 24d ago
Mr. Gotcha, is that you? https://thenib.com/mister-gotcha/ https://thenib.com/mister-gotcha/
causalmodels 24d ago
The datacenter topic is cursed because people are afraid of ai. People seized on water usage because it is a more legible and tractable focus for their fear.
everdrive 24d ago
There would need to be some articulable upside to data centers, though. Even if we agree there should be less livestock, I don't see how that has any bearing on the data centers topic.
- silverquiet 24d ago
  I assume HN runs on machines in a datacenter. The servers that serve my business also reside in a datacenter. I see lots of upsides to datacenters, and they've been around long before they were controversial.
  - everdrive 24d ago
    And you own clothing that was made with child labor. You monster. Why do you love child labor so much?
  - shimman 24d ago
    Hyper scale data centers are absolutely not the same, stop with the hysterics. You know exactly what people are upset about: LLM companies.
  - bdangubic 24d ago
    yup, we need trillion bucks in capex to run HN so no compliants from me, I love HN
- theultdev 24d ago
  It's to put water usage in perspective. I think the best example is golf courses. If you think datacenters are a waste of water and you want to do a global campaign to stop building / shutdown golf courses first, then your values don't really make sense. Golf is pure leisure, and uses 531 gallons compared to 17.4 gallons a year. Datacenters on the other hand, power the site we're using right now to discuss the "problem". You wouldn't be able to have this conversation without them. -- Why aren't people screaming constantly about golf courses and pressuring to shut them down? Why the focus on datacenters if the bigger win is staring you right in the face (if you're that concerned about water usage)? It's not about the water.
angiolillo 24d ago
> I had someone berate me for defending datacenter water use and their last post was literally a cheese burger. I can imagine raising issues with a specific datacenter in a specific water-constrained location, but I agree that being vocally concerned about the teaspoons of water consumed to produce an AI response while being unconcerned with the thousands of gallons used to produce a cheeseburger seems like innumerate virtue signaling.
- Eddy_Viscosity2 15d ago
  Most people do not see data centers benefiting them in any way but do benefit from eating meat (because they like it). Also, this is an additional water consumption that in a time when water resources are already strained in many areas for all those other uses mentioned. An analogy would be if you have $5000 a month on income but spend $4950 on rent, utilities, insurance, food, etc. then its not hypocritical to say that you shouldn't give an additional $200 to the local billionaire because that's only a small percentage of what you spend on rent. 'Hey man, if you can afford to live indoors, the least you can do is go into debt for local billionaire to become even more billionairy'
eesmith 24d ago
Is this a "Let he who is without sin cast the first stone" objection, where even the slightest bit of hypocrisy or impurity justifies rejecting the argument? If a vegetarian, who became a vegetarian because of the high environmental impact of meat production, berates you for defending data center water use, would that convince you to change your mind? What about a vegan, who also stopped flying and doesn't drive, and is organizing a protest to shut down the local golf course?
shimman 24d ago
Yeah why would someone berate you for telling them to stop eating and support data centers? Gee why would someone get so emotional when told to stop enjoying food and help the billionaires make more money? Are they stupid or something?
bitcharmer 24d ago
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zug_zug 24d ago

Well the thing with the livestock is that you have to give a cow water. Datacenters do not need water. It is just slightly cheaper for them than cooling with electricity. Datacenters should be required by law to pay to build adequate power generation and infrastructure to pay for their consumption, and ideally in a way where it isn't a ghastly eyesore.

jp191919 24d ago
We do not need meat.
- LaSombra 24d ago
  We do not need more datacenters as well.
- zug_zug 24d ago
  Datacenters have a readily available substitute to water if they just make less profit. I'm not giving up my meat so that datacenters can use it for cooling, if that's what you're suggesting.
  - raincole 24d ago
    So? Many people are not willing to give up their cloud services either? And there are other kinds of meat that cost less water to produce. I don't think someone who isn't willing to give up beef for chicken is at a higher moral ground than someone who wants cheap tokens.
  - chneu 24d ago
    Give up your meat consumption because it's more about societal excess than anything else. Meat is and mostly always has been(in euro societies) a luxury item meant mostly for the rich. Capitalism turned meat into a MUST HAVE item for keeping up with the Joneses. We consume absolute insane amounts of meat nowadays, and we waste about half of it, just so people can feel good cuz theyre eating a high class excess meal. Lol most people throughout history didn't eat much meat. It's wild how modern western people refuse to see how we'll destroy the planet trying to feed 8 billion people with the most inefficient method of creating calories(beef). The inefficiency IS THE POINT.
  - ben_w 24d ago
    From the above stats, a 2.3% change to USA meat consumption, up or down, has the same impact as a 100% change to data centre water consumption, up or down. If I read the USDA stats correctly, US red meat and poultry production went up about 5.6% from Jan-Jun 2025 to Jan-Jun 2026, i.e. the increased production of meat led to an increase in water use that was twice as much as the water use of all the data centres combined.
    - atmavatar 24d ago
      It's not quite that simple. Most people who reduce/eliminate meat consumption are going to substitute something else rather than eat less, and what they substitute may be just as water intensive as the meat they replace. For example, if a person's meat diet is virtually all chicken (reasonable given prices lately), substituting the chicken for almonds is a net neutral change. Almonds use every bit as much water as chickens do. Granted, that may be an extreme example, as almonds are one of the more water-intensive crops, and chicken is one of the most water-efficient meats. There will likely be decent water savings in many cases, but at the very least, anything a person substitutes for their existing meat diet is going to use some water as well.
- lightedman 24d ago
  In fact many humans need meat because the proper plant protein simply cannot grow/exist in their area. This is why we evolved to be omnivores. Basic biology laughs at your poorly-researched position.
  - jp191919 24d ago
    I'm referring to the majority of the population that lives in modern developed areas.
- ghunio 24d ago
  True. I was going to hate the environmental destruction being wrought for the purpose of funneling more of our wealth to a handful billionaires who will use the AI against us, but then I remembered how bad meat eaters are for the plight of the common man, and now data centers don’t seem so bad after all.
Ajedi32 24d ago
You don't need a law to force people to pay for resources they consume; basic economics already ensures that. If there are externalities not already accounted for by that (increased demand for water/electricity driving up costs for others, noise, "eyesores", etc.) you could pass laws to ensure those costs are paid by the responsible party but that's not a datacenter-specific issue.
- zug_zug 24d ago
  Don't quote theoretical econ idealism at us when our actual electricity rates are going up 20% or more per year. Increased demand absolutely DOES increase the cost both in theory and practice.
  - Ajedi32 24d ago
    I... agree? Did you even read the comment you replied to?
- skinfaxi 24d ago
  How does that work in a market where you are bidding amongst other participants and capacity is constrained? Supply is limited and demand is growing, the market response is to charge more.
  - Ajedi32 24d ago
    Well, just off the top of my head... if you wanted to treat the increased prices caused by the spike in demand as an externality (and I agree that's not exactly the right way to think of it, but people seem determined to in this case and I can't really fault them for that given the practical effects of such price increases) I think the way to do that would be to give existing consumers futures contracts for water for the next ~10 years proportional to their existing usage. People could then either use the futures contracts to keep the price they pay for water the same as it was, or voluntarily reduce their water usage and sell the contracts to the datacenter for a profit. Same deal for power. This would of course be a bit complicated for most people to manage, so maybe instead of giving consumers the contracts directly you could have some intermediary manage the contracts for them with approximately the same result.
wraptile 24d ago
> Well the thing with the livestock is that you have to give a cow water. you don't _need_ a cow though
- chneu 24d ago
  Exactly. You also don't need to grow acres of grass in the desert to feed the cow, but we do that too. Most folks have highly distorted views of how animal agriculture works. It's disgusting and insanely inefficient.
- LaSombra 24d ago
  As you don't _need_ a datacenter as well
citrin_ru 24d ago
> Datacenters do not need water. It is just slightly cheaper for them than cooling with electricity. As long as electricity at least partially produced using fossil fuel I would prefer data-centers to use as little electricity as possible. There are regions which are getting plenty of rainfall on average (which can be collected and stored) or were getting some water from rivers will have negligible ecological impact. But currently DC operators have little incentives to choose DC location based on outdoor temperature or water availability and there are plenty of DCs in hot and arid regions.
- jandrewrogers 24d ago
  > there are plenty of DCs in hot and arid regions Differences in air temperature are largely below the noise floor in terms of impact on data center cost. Slightly lower energy prices and other operational or capital costs are more than enough to offset significantly hotter climate. Arid climates improve evaporative cooling efficiency.
ben_w 24d ago
While I agree fully with this part: > Datacenters should be required by law to pay to build adequate power generation and infrastructure to pay for their consumption, and ideally in a way where it isn't a ghastly eyesore. Fact is, almost nobody "needs" meat in their diet, and even if all meat eaters did actually need it rather than merely want it, there are meats which use less than the average quantity of water. From the above stats, the mean American's loss of water due to unnecessary use of water for unnecessary meat raised in their territory, is about 43 times the mean American's loss of water due to the unnecessary water use of datacenters that are in their territory.
wraptile 24d ago
> Datacenters should be required by law to pay to build adequate power generation and infrastructure to pay for their consumption I think we can all agree on this one yet this is not what's being argued in most discussions. What hangs up the discussion is the complexity of development e.g.: to build a datacenter it takes 1 year but to build energy infra it takes 5. So this complexity needs equally complex policy and people just don't have time for that when there's free range raging served right to your palm screen.

thawawaycold 24d ago

yeah people should just accept starting to feed on AI slop for sustenance instead of actual food! How dare they have a preference

wraptile 24d ago
calling it "actual food" is clearly misleading when majority of meat is used purely for entertainment not for survival sustenance. By that logic compute is "actual medicine" because some of compute is used for medicine?
- thawawaycold 24d ago
  > majority of meat is used purely for entertainment Source of that inane statement?

KennyBlanken 24d ago

Mr. Gotcha, is that you? https://thenib.com/mister-gotcha/ https://thenib.com/mister-gotcha/

causalmodels 24d ago

The datacenter topic is cursed because people are afraid of ai. People seized on water usage because it is a more legible and tractable focus for their fear.

everdrive 24d ago

There would need to be some articulable upside to data centers, though. Even if we agree there should be less livestock, I don't see how that has any bearing on the data centers topic.

silverquiet 24d ago
I assume HN runs on machines in a datacenter. The servers that serve my business also reside in a datacenter. I see lots of upsides to datacenters, and they've been around long before they were controversial.
- everdrive 24d ago
  And you own clothing that was made with child labor. You monster. Why do you love child labor so much?
- shimman 24d ago
  Hyper scale data centers are absolutely not the same, stop with the hysterics. You know exactly what people are upset about: LLM companies.
- bdangubic 24d ago
  yup, we need trillion bucks in capex to run HN so no compliants from me, I love HN
theultdev 24d ago
It's to put water usage in perspective. I think the best example is golf courses. If you think datacenters are a waste of water and you want to do a global campaign to stop building / shutdown golf courses first, then your values don't really make sense. Golf is pure leisure, and uses 531 gallons compared to 17.4 gallons a year. Datacenters on the other hand, power the site we're using right now to discuss the "problem". You wouldn't be able to have this conversation without them. -- Why aren't people screaming constantly about golf courses and pressuring to shut them down? Why the focus on datacenters if the bigger win is staring you right in the face (if you're that concerned about water usage)? It's not about the water.

angiolillo 24d ago

> I had someone berate me for defending datacenter water use and their last post was literally a cheese burger. I can imagine raising issues with a specific datacenter in a specific water-constrained location, but I agree that being vocally concerned about the teaspoons of water consumed to produce an AI response while being unconcerned with the thousands of gallons used to produce a cheeseburger seems like innumerate virtue signaling.

Eddy_Viscosity2 15d ago
Most people do not see data centers benefiting them in any way but do benefit from eating meat (because they like it). Also, this is an additional water consumption that in a time when water resources are already strained in many areas for all those other uses mentioned. An analogy would be if you have $5000 a month on income but spend $4950 on rent, utilities, insurance, food, etc. then its not hypocritical to say that you shouldn't give an additional $200 to the local billionaire because that's only a small percentage of what you spend on rent. 'Hey man, if you can afford to live indoors, the least you can do is go into debt for local billionaire to become even more billionairy'

eesmith 24d ago

Is this a "Let he who is without sin cast the first stone" objection, where even the slightest bit of hypocrisy or impurity justifies rejecting the argument? If a vegetarian, who became a vegetarian because of the high environmental impact of meat production, berates you for defending data center water use, would that convince you to change your mind? What about a vegan, who also stopped flying and doesn't drive, and is organizing a protest to shut down the local golf course?

shimman 24d ago

Yeah why would someone berate you for telling them to stop eating and support data centers? Gee why would someone get so emotional when told to stop enjoying food and help the billionaires make more money? Are they stupid or something?

bitcharmer 24d ago

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