- Microsoft promises to replenish water and pay for the energy consumed by its new data centers
- Next data centers will be ‘community first’, promises
- Backlash against environmentally damaging data centers has delayed projects
Microsoft has announced its new initiative to build a “community-first AI infrastructure,” which the company says is a “commitment to doing this work differently than others and doing it responsibly.”
Within this, the technology giant promises to cover the financial cost of the energy consumed by data centers, a burden that until now has fallen on the consumer; Current estimates estimate that artificial intelligence infrastructure will see energy demand increase by almost 300% by 2035.
This commitment from Microsoft comes after President Trump called on technology companies to “pay for themselves” for their data centers, where he singled out Microsoft for leading the charge among technology companies and taking responsibility for their own infrastructure.
Different from ‘some others’
“This commits us to taking concrete steps necessary to be a good neighbor in the communities where we build, own and operate our data centers,” Microsoft added. “It reflects our sense of civic responsibility, as well as a broad, long-term vision of what it will take to successfully run an AI infrastructure business. In short, we will set a high bar.”
This commitment comes in five forms; pay utility rates to ensure energy prices do not increase, replenish more water than the data center uses, create jobs for residents, pay taxes to invest in local infrastructure, and invest in local AI training and nonprofits.
Data centers have been notoriously accused of creating serious and substantial water supply concerns (especially in areas that commonly struggle with drought and water shortage issues), and some local homeowners have reported losing access to drinking water.
Although these data centers may seem reminiscent of large factories or manufacturing plants that carry similar environmental concerns, it is important to note that these data centers create very few jobs once built and only require a small number of technicians to service the center.
It’s not surprising to see these commitments of goodwill from tech companies, not because they care about the communities they “serve,” but because communities are struggling with the harmful effects of such massive, energy- and water-consuming infrastructure built to support a technology that most consumers “don’t care about.”
In fact, reports claim that around $64 billion worth of data center projects in the United States have been delayed or blocked by local bipartisan opposition. Microsoft is already rumored to have canceled several billion-dollar data center projects, so this shift toward a responsible data center model isn’t entirely surprising.
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