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Rapid construction of data centers across the United States to meet requirements Growing needs for artificial intelligence tools It has become a controversial topic, with State laws emerged To reduce their construction, and Cities and Individually Weighing them to stop them.
As technology giants rush to build these massive AI data centers, Critics doubted the Land, water and energy They are marginalized, including the protesters who are watching Microsoft build An AI-focused software conference in San Francisco this week.
Amy Herman was one of the people stationed at the entrance to the Fort Mason Events Center, where they handed out fliers detailing the impacts of the data centers being built. I talked to her about her fears.
“I would say it’s an oppositional point of view,” she explained when I asked about the protest. “It’s not that we’re against technology, or against any kind of monetization of innovation.”
Balancing limited natural resources with big tech companies that don’t want to take responsibility for managing climate change while pursuing technological progress is a bigger challenge, she said.
“What we are doing to our planet and all the impacts that are having, not just here in San Francisco but across the United States,” Herman said, adding that “the ripple effects of that will be felt.”
Protests took place outside the Microsoft Build conference at Fort Mason in San Francisco.
during Microsoft build keyword On Tuesday morning, CEO Satya Nadella said Microsoft would seek community permission to build data centers in the future.
It aims to gain approval from local residents by improving cooling systems and reducing water use by data centres; ensuring that data centers do not increase electricity prices for local residents; In addition to “the tax base that funds hospitals, schools, parks, and local libraries,” and investing in artificial intelligence training and non-profit organizations in those areas.
Nadella called the rapid construction of data centers “extraordinary” during a live broadcast on Tuesday with Sarah Joe and Elad Jill Men No precedence And SWEX from Latent space.
“At this point, it’s clear that we as an industry are very principled about ensuring that the benefits of all the things we’re talking about are felt in real ways at the community level,” Nadella said. “It has to be real, where people say, ‘This doesn’t change energy prices for me. In fact, it lowers prices because in the long run there will be a better grid, there will be more energy… and the water gets replenished.’”
He stressed the importance of urging communities to purchase artificial intelligence technologies and the data centers that drive them.
“All this must be real. If so, we will get permission,” he said. “If not, you won’t get permission; it’s that simple.”
He added that Microsoft is seeking to add jobs during and after building these massive data centers — but he said people are right to question all of that.
“We have to take it seriously as an industry,” Nadella said. “I think it’s good for communities to be skeptical, to ask the hard questions.”
Some of the people asking these questions were outside the Microsoft Build alongside Herman, with colorful photographs depicting scenes of corporate greed, pollution and poverty, eager to talk with conference-goers.
One major issue is that electricity prices in rural areas are too high, Herman said Higher than they were Before data centers were built in these communities, people were forced to choose between paying for medical support or electricity bills.
Microsoft has more than 500 data centers in 80 regions, with the tech giant adding more data center capacity in the past 18 months than it did in the first decade of its Azure cloud services. And they are not just in the United States, but in the rest of the world – Australia, New Zealand, Asia, Africa, the Middle East, Europe and South America.
Nadella explained how the design of Microsoft’s data center will change and consume only the amount of water a restaurant consumes in a year.
Talk during the keynote about Fair water Data Center – “Our First AI Superfactory” Nadella breaks down the three main workflows of these factories into AI training, inference, and agent runtime.
“The entire system was designed from the ground up for artificial intelligence,” Nadella said. “And we’re even rethinking power delivery… How can we deliver hundreds of kilowatts per row while minimizing… the switching loss that occurs from the grid to the silicon?”
Fairwater launched ahead of schedule in April, with Nadella describing it as “the world’s most powerful AI data center” in Posting on social media site.
He says there’s a new approach to using water in the Fairwater AI data center’s cooling system, which is filled only once and can then run “water-free” after that.
“The daily water use over an entire year is roughly equivalent to what one restaurant uses,” Nadella said on Tuesday.
Some data centers currently under construction “will use more energy than large cities,” according to the American “Space” website. Harvard Law School‘s Ari Bisco.
Microsoft says Fairwater It has “reliable and cost-effective power”, with approximately 140 kW per rack, and 1,360 kW per row, as well as software and hardware solutions to reduce off-peak power and use “an on-site energy storage solution to further mask power fluctuations without using excess energy”. For comparison, the energy use of a typical residential utility customer in the United States is About 1.2 kW.
Data center protesters came outside the Build conference carrying colorful signs resembling the Windows logo.
During Tuesday morning’s keynote, Nadella said Microsoft’s new principles for building data centers include ensuring “we don’t increase electricity prices, making sure we’re replenishing all of our water use, creating jobs in local communities for local people, adding to the tax base, and making sure we’re strengthening communities by investing in local training and nonprofits in the area.”
“Only when we stick to these principles and do the hard work around them will we get permission to move forward, innovate and build,” the CEO said.
When I asked Herman about Microsoft’s promises to give back to local communities after getting their permission to build data centers there, she expressed dubious hope.
“If they are truly that invested, I would love to see them develop a more collaborative business development model that embeds democratic values at the core of their operational agendas,” she said. “I haven’t seen this in action internally as a company, so why would I trust it at the local government level?”
