"A single data center can use as much power as the city of Philadelphia. And they're popping up everywhere. These sprawling buildings, filled with rows of computing equipment, are the factories of the A.I. economy; they power all those mundane chatbot searches, sucking up tons of energy in the process. As the OpenAI C.E.O. Sam Altman put it, "I do guess that a lot of the world gets covered in data centers over time.""
"It's a giant shed full of microchips. From the outside, they keep them as anonymous and boring-looking as possible, and then the inside is just racks and racks of computing equipment stretching off into the distance. It does not feel like a place a human being should be inside. In fact, they try to limit the amount that people go into them. They're totally clean, contamination-proof, humidity- and temperature-controlled. It feels like going into a bank vault almost. You're inside the computer's brain."
A single data center can use as much power as the city of Philadelphia. Data centers are proliferating globally and house rows of computing equipment that power AI services and chatbot queries. These facilities consume tons of energy and are designed to be anonymous externally while containing controlled, contamination-free interiors with limited human access. They are built as large, warehouse-like structures filled with racks of microchips and require strict humidity and temperature control. The construction and deployment of such centers represent one of the largest movements of capital in human history, comparable to electrification, railroads, or automobile adoption. The rapid expansion raises significant concerns about environmental impacts and the sustainability of AI's energy demands.
Read at The New Yorker
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