Think Globally, Worry Locally
While there is no risk of big tech companies literally draining the oceans to power the data centers behind their LLMs, even medium-sized data centers can have a big impact on nearby water resources. For example, a single Meta Data Center in Newton County, Georgia, now uses about 10 percent of the entire county’s water supply, according to a New York Times report last year. And the Interstate Commission on the Potomac River Basin recently estimated that data centers account for 8 percent of total water consumption in the region, a rate that could reach 29 percent by 2050 if the large concentration of data centers in Northern Virginia continues at this pace.
This type of concentrated water use can place severe strain on local infrastructure and water supplies, and has led to at least one situation where a data center withdrew millions of gallons from local sources without initial payment. Local impacts may be particularly severe in areas that are already water-stressed; A 2025 Business Insider report found that 40 percent of planned and existing data centers in the US are in areas with “high” or “extremely high” water scarcity, as measured by the World Resources Institute.
In light of these concerns, the largest technology companies are keen to project an image of efficiency and responsible management with regard to water supply. Amazon says it is letting data centers run hotter to use less water to cool them, helping it use less water per kilowatt-hour than other major data center providers. Amazon also says it is funding “50 water projects, which are expected to restore more than 5.8 billion gallons of water annually for use by local communities,” and Google has 165 water management projects, which it says are “expected to restore more than 19 billion gallons of water annually by 2030.”
If all the memes and concerns about water consumption in data centers are helping to foster this kind of environmental responsibility among PR-focused big tech companies, then all the better. But if your concerned friend starts worrying about AI data centers literally causing havoc around the world, hopefully the actual numbers involved will put those concerns to rest.
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