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A key aspect of the currently debated paper on "AI" models' water usage is in the last paragraphs:

Data centers were pushed to "follow the sun" in order to reduce carbon emissions by harnessing (cheap) solar energy. Cool!

But locations with a lot of sun often get very hot during the warmer months requiring a lot of water to cool them.

So by trying to emit less carbon (and because solar power is very cheap of course, it's not to be nice) companies are contributing to the aridification of the regions they moved to.

"AI" (and to a lesser degree all digital infrastructure) has massive impact on the environment. It's not an ethereal thing that we can decouple from our other activities.

https://arxiv.org/abs/2304.03271