cross-posted from: https://piefed.blahaj.zone/c/michigan/p/403803/a-small-town-is-fighting-a-1-2-billion-ai-datacenter-for-america-s-nuclear-weapon
Ypsilanti, Michigan has officially decided to fight against the construction of a ‘high-performance computing facility’ that would service a nuclear weapons laboratory 1,500 miles away.
You know they’re just buildings full of servers, right?
I mean, I’d rather have a data center than some toxic chemical factory or a busy warehouse in my neighborhood. Data centers just… sit there. They use a lot of power and some use a lot of water, but if your region doesn’t have power/water problems it’s not really much of an impact.
A nation’s supercomputing power used to be something people celebrated. Especially one owned and operated by a place like Los Alamos National Laboratory.
Go look at places these things operate they don’t just sit there. The noise alone is in the ranges that requires hearing protection. And if you live near one you will loose all your water. Then add the lights. These places cause physical harm to people living near them.
Take a long, hard look at the impact. Higher utility bills for everyone. Massive light noise. Noise, incessant noise. Water pressure issues.
Local residents in cities with data centers are dealing with higher electricity costs. Those costs get passed on from the corps to the local residents. On top of that they’re dealing with water scarcity and pollution.