Steve Everley: War on Datacenters is a Replay of the War on Fracking
A dark money war on datacenters funded by the same billionaire and foreign interests who tried and failed to kill hydraulic fracturing 20 years ago is rapidly forming into shape. It not only involves the same tactics and messaging, but many of the same people, too.
Just as the war on fracking was transparently designed to prevent the U.S. oil and gas industry from competing with Russia and Saudi Arabia, this war on datacenters is transparently designed to harm America’s ability to win the fierce AI race vs. China.
There are no real mysteries here.
Worse, our friend Tim Stewart at USOGA pointed out in an X post last night that the war on datacenters has taken the additional step of incorporating the same violent, Marxist/Alinskyite tactics we’ve witnessed in the pro-Hamas astroturf protest movement funded by Soros NGOs.
It’s all so utterly despicable and sadly predictable, isn’t it?
Steve Everley posted the fantastic thread below on X yesterday providing all the details about the war on data centers. Importantly, as Steve points out towards the end of this thread, the obvious fact that this astroturf war on datacenters is building does not mean that all opposition to them is funded by dark money. Quite the contrary is true, in fact.
Despite all the provably false propaganda ginned up by the NGOs 18-20 years ago about fracking, plenty of valid claims were raised by honest people as well. Matter of fact, valid claims continue to rise out in the Permian Basin and other shale plays even today. The industry and regulators had to deal with those claims and correct the problems that caused them, often at great expense and reputational hits. That is how the system is supposed to work in this country.
The same is and will continue to be true related to the datacenter boom, just as it has been true during every major industrial boom time in our nation’s history.
Property rights matter.
Health impacts that are provable and real matter.
Real pollution impacts matter.
All of these things and more matter to real people.
The trouble comes in figuring out how to pick out the real issues impacting real people from the wave of rancid, dishonest propaganda generated by big money interests, some of which are coming from competing nations. That is what Steve is trying to do with this excellent thread on X.
Read it, absorb it, and steel yourselves for the battles to come. It’s 2008 all over again, only some of these people literally would happily threaten to kill to get what they want.
That is all.
Some of the opposition may be astroturf, but citizens have excellent reasons to oppose data centers, not least of which is a well earned hatred of Big Tech. Robert Bryce is covering the actual Grass Roots side of the opposition.
Big Tech has spent 30 years exporting our jobs to other nations and when that was inconvenient, rigging the legal system in the USA to import millions of foreigners to replace US workers and keep wages depressed.
These are the organizations that will sculpt how AI behaves and the data that it outputs. Why should we trust them one iota?
The starting wage for an excellent graduate in EE is the same today as it was in 2000. About a 50% decrease in real terms. What kind of shortage causes a decrease in price? Yet, Big Tech has lied and lied and lied claiming non existent shortages in STEM workers for the last 30 years.
These are the people we should trust with the mechanisms that will inexorably shape and dominate our futures?
My issue with them is that they want to do the same thing as utility solar for many of rhe same reasons.
They want large swaths of land that is relatively cleared, near a large power line that doesnt cost them much... that equals rural farmland.
Many farmers have trouble refusing the offers. The price (in rural areas), to the developers is cheap compared to what it would cost in an urban area.
Most of us who live in rural areas, do so because we agree to the inconvenience in order to have peace and quiet. IF we wanted urban sprawl and industrial construction, we'd stay in urban areas.
The water issue in my county WOULD be an issue. We are part utility water but mostly wells. We have a reservoir and already have water issues. The one approved DC in our county would use around 450k gallons PER DAY. That is more than the entire county uses NOW. That's a problem. I've heard most DCs are reluctant to use closed loop type systems because of the cost.
My personal issue (other than water and land use) is that I think technology is moving so fast that we will be stuck with these HUGE "white elephants" in 5-10 years. I remember Cray computers... now we carry them (and more) around in our hand or on our wrists. I see the massive buildings as a Cray... in the near future could that building fit on a desktop? If so what do we do with those useless/outdated monstrosities? The farms are gone.
Do we REALLY need one on every "street corner"? Rather than charging ahead with no plan other than developers making lots of money (ie utility solar developers) with little else considered, how about a long term plan with a spread of the development in areas of planned expansion or industry, NOT rural farmland and forests. Maybe a plan that looks at future needs.
I fear a DC construction bubble. There is a smaller building that I pass often... it was completed late last summer and is STILL EMPTY. This was built by a "developer" hoping to cash in on the craze. I'll be interested to see what happens to that building. Id like to see the many abandoned factories or office building in the country be used/considered FIRST before building new.
Anyway, this is my rant... sorry to be so long but I dont want to see my county full of big ugly building rather than fields of cows, horses and food. 😢