Your language is ambiguous — your horror is in reference to natural gas turbine generators (used at these installations) and not gasoline generators (like in a home context)?
Why the horror? I'd prefer the gas remain in the ground, but given the gassy production of US shale oil, I guess I'd rather it be used for this than just flared. I am frustrated that pollutant emissions aren't being policed, and also that the sudden turbine demand plus supply chain issues mean using aeroderivative turbines that are quite a bit less efficient than more complex combined cycle turbines.
> I guess I'd rather it be used for this than just flared
I doubt this is really reducing the rates of flaring and leaky wells. Its just additional demand.
The biggest problem I've seen is they tend to build these somewhat close to residential areas with generation on-site. Often these power generation centers aren't right next to residential areas due to both air and noise pollution. But governments are often seeming to turn a blind eye.
Yes, the noise pollution is insane. Benn Jordan's YT video "Datacenters Behaving Like Acoustic Weapons" is an insightful, scary 30 min video covering the datacenter infrasound noise, and the nasty things infrasound does to people: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_bP80DEAbuo
It's not supposed to be permanent, but it also allows them to not waste time waiting on physical locations to be built. Given how highly competitive this all is, I'm not surprised at all.
The whole thing is like a video game: your construction and power are your limiting factors. We need to CONSTRUCT ADDITIONAL PYLONS and so on. It's interesting that this is such a limiter on the ground that SpaceX is pursuing AI satellites in space. Truly an incredible time to be alive.
Meta's first five buildings took between two and three years to build, but Williams is almost done building out 200 MW (additional) off-grid power plants in a year, and to match that they're putting their equipment in tents. That raises questions for me:
* Did they expect the next five buildings to also take between two and three years to build if done in the same manner? I'd hope it'd be significantly faster the second time because they've perfected the design, found good local contractors and suppliers, etc.
* How much of the time was the actual structure vs. all the stuff inside they still have to do with the tents?
* How long are they expecting to keep this? Are they anticipating extra problems like leaking roofs?
* What are the "off-grid power plants"? Is this basically a whole bunch of diesel or natural gas generators? [edit: oh, yes, "The site is also powered by 200 megawatts of modular gas turbines". I wonder if they're trucking in the fuel too.] If so, yuck.
Microsoft had a neat trick here in the Netherlands: instead of opening a new site they decided to make a their existing site higher by adding a few floors.
Ofcourse that only works once the Dutch borg adapts!
As always, there are some very erudite comments here on HN, which is why I like the site so much. My erudite comment, or rather question, is this: why aren't these people using AI to solve all these problems? Surely it would be a good test of The Product and maybe it would give s[ck]eptics some food for thought?
Microsoft had trialed datacenters in tents nearly 20 years ago. I remember hearing about their trials at some talks back in the day. Crazy to look back on the dates here, felt like it wasn't that long ago.
But a billion active users != number of US citizens that take on the burden of AI. So go build your AI on land where your customers are if they like it so much.
If a large proportion of people are only using AI because they are being threatened with unemployment if they don't, then there's going to be massive resentment building up
You may think that doesn't matter, but it does. History has shown over and over that you can only keep a lid on massive social resentment for so long before things break
I think good governance would listen to polls over metrics.
A good example of how this works is cocaine.
Capitalism and competition isn't always good governance. It works brilliantly in many places, such as restaurants or commodity goods. It fails completely for medicine or banking. It's in between for tech or education, but it's clearly failing for AI.
>I think good governance would listen to polls over metrics.
hypothetically, you own a widget company. you sell a lot of widgets. every month, you are selling even more widgets. the widgets are flying off the shelves. you keep ramping up production, and the consumers keep on buying.
gallup releases a poll that says "people hate widgets".
this does not matter from the business perspective.
microsoft does not care that your company forces you to use their products. google does not care that your school forces you to use their products. etc.
The public hates ai but also uses ai in mass quantities.
Capitalism abides by your dollars not your voice.
So people can decry ai all they want but if they keep using it, it won't go away.
Even then it's probable that AI is a big enough productivity boost for certain industries that even if no consumers used AI, businesses would still prop AI up enough for it to live on.
Yeah but the public is against progress. The public cries for material needs like medicare for all, universal childcare, a jobs program? These are all clearly foreign actors that want to prevent American progress on AI! They must be Chinese agents for all we know, what sort of American wants to provide healthcare for their family over proudly paying higher utility rates to ensure a new batch of tech bros become billionaires?
Why the horror? I'd prefer the gas remain in the ground, but given the gassy production of US shale oil, I guess I'd rather it be used for this than just flared. I am frustrated that pollutant emissions aren't being policed, and also that the sudden turbine demand plus supply chain issues mean using aeroderivative turbines that are quite a bit less efficient than more complex combined cycle turbines.
https://www.energy.gov/hgeo/how-gas-turbine-power-plants-wor...
Only about 35 percent is “associated gas” production from oil production.
I doubt this is really reducing the rates of flaring and leaky wells. Its just additional demand.
The biggest problem I've seen is they tend to build these somewhat close to residential areas with generation on-site. Often these power generation centers aren't right next to residential areas due to both air and noise pollution. But governments are often seeming to turn a blind eye.
* Did they expect the next five buildings to also take between two and three years to build if done in the same manner? I'd hope it'd be significantly faster the second time because they've perfected the design, found good local contractors and suppliers, etc.
* How much of the time was the actual structure vs. all the stuff inside they still have to do with the tents?
* How long are they expecting to keep this? Are they anticipating extra problems like leaking roofs?
* What are the "off-grid power plants"? Is this basically a whole bunch of diesel or natural gas generators? [edit: oh, yes, "The site is also powered by 200 megawatts of modular gas turbines". I wonder if they're trucking in the fuel too.] If so, yuck.
Seems everyone else imagined a camping tent. Different backgrounds I guess.
Heck, call it public housing and bringing jobs into the community.
Ofcourse that only works once the Dutch borg adapts!
https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/hyperscalers/new-from-mi...
and
Safety
Are opposites.
from a business perspective, which of those two statistics would you give more weight?
Is is OK for them to build datacenters in US?
"People use AI so this must be a revealed preference" is such a bad argument when people are feeling so precarious
in the context of answering the implied question of the parent (everyone hates it so why do they keep doing it?), it does not matter at all.
If a large proportion of people are only using AI because they are being threatened with unemployment if they don't, then there's going to be massive resentment building up
You may think that doesn't matter, but it does. History has shown over and over that you can only keep a lid on massive social resentment for so long before things break
why should a company listen to a gallup poll of ~1,500 people over their own internal metrics?
do you think all types of companies should heed the advice of gallup polls over their own metrics, experience, and research?
A good example of how this works is cocaine.
Capitalism and competition isn't always good governance. It works brilliantly in many places, such as restaurants or commodity goods. It fails completely for medicine or banking. It's in between for tech or education, but it's clearly failing for AI.
hypothetically, you own a widget company. you sell a lot of widgets. every month, you are selling even more widgets. the widgets are flying off the shelves. you keep ramping up production, and the consumers keep on buying.
gallup releases a poll that says "people hate widgets".
would you stop/slow down your widget production?
this does not matter from the business perspective.
microsoft does not care that your company forces you to use their products. google does not care that your school forces you to use their products. etc.
Capitalism abides by your dollars not your voice.
So people can decry ai all they want but if they keep using it, it won't go away.
Even then it's probable that AI is a big enough productivity boost for certain industries that even if no consumers used AI, businesses would still prop AI up enough for it to live on.
Simone Weil had good theoretical and practical observations on force vs economy 100 years ago.