My city is having a town hall to discuss how to handle AI data centers being built. Anyone have any good resources on talking points? In particular I'd love to know what the pro AI strawman arguments are and how to shut them down if they come up...

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[–] 3 points 2 months ago

Pick a few strong arguments, don't go with a sack.

Use news (yes, anecdotal) too. Some places have already been fucked over.

Water Behind the Watts: The Hidden Risk of Powering Data Centers https://www.ceres.org/resources/reports/water-behind-the-watts-the-hidden-risk-of-powering-data-centers

The carbon and water footprints of data centers and what this could mean for artificial intelligence - ScienceDirect https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666389925002788

Data Centers Are So Power Hungry That Cow Manure Fuel Is Now on the Table https://www.zmescience.com/ecology/animals-ecology/data-centers-are-so-power-hungry-that-cow-manure-fuel-is-now-on-the-table/

5 ways data centers endanger their local communities and the country as a whole https://theconversation.com/5-ways-data-centers-endanger-their-local-communities-and-the-country-as-a-whole-282348

https://www.wired.com/story/new-gas-powered-data-centers-could-emit-more-greenhouse-gases-than-entire-nations/

https://eelp.law.harvard.edu/extracting-profits-from-the-public-how-utility-ratepayers-are-paying-for-big-techs-power/

Extracting Profits from the Public: How Utility Ratepayers Are Paying for Big Tech’s Power – Environmental and Energy Law Program https://www.eesi.org/articles/view/data-centers-and-water-consumption

https://pivot-to-ai.com/2025/11/07/the-futile-future-of-the-gigawatt-datacenter-by-nicholas-weaver/

https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/cooling/ai-cooling-demands-push-data-centers-into-deep-water

https://cee.illinois.edu/news/AIs-Challenging-Waters

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