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Data centers are creating ‘heat islands’ and warming the land around them by up to 16 degrees | CNN (www.cnn.com)
submitted 7 months ago by to c/technology@lemmy.world
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The vast data centers that power artificial intelligence are so energy hungry that they’re heating up their surroundings, according to new research. It’s an alarming finding given the number of data centers is predicted to explode over the next few years.

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[–] 2 points 7 months ago (2 children)

You'll need the same number of cooling towers for the computers too. All the energy created by the reactor will turn into heat, essentially doubling the amount of cooling needed.

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  • [–] 2 points 7 months ago (1 child)

    I don't know why they don't use geothermal cooling, especially with the footprint these things have. Compared to everything else it wouldn't increase the cost that much, depending on how they do it, and even if it didn't cover all the cooling needs it would cut down a lot of it.

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  • [–] 1 point 7 months ago

    I have no idea, but I suspect geothermal cooling doesn't work as well at this scale. I suspect heat in the ground spreads far slower than the air moves. Since these are running 24/7, this means it'll reach an elevated equilibrium temperature that will be higher than if a residential house did it. I guess if the footprint is large enough it'd be fine, but that's probably really expensive.

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