Notices by Gerry McGovern (gerrymcgovern@mastodon.green)

"Willie Nelson has become an unlikely barometer of America's biggest infrastructure fights. He once protested the Keystone XL pipeline and fracking. Today, he's fighting data centers. The American icon's latest cause underscores how the politics surrounding AI infrastructure are beginning to resemble the last decade's fights over fossil fuels."

https://www.axios.com/2026/08/14/data-center-backlash-fossil-fuel-protests

"A nonprofit environmental group is threatening to take a major Georgia data center to federal court, alleging its construction site is sending contaminated runoff into a creek that feeds the Flint River. The Flint Riverkeeper, along with local homeowners, sent a formal “intent to sue” notice to QTS Data Center in Fayetteville, alleging the company has repeatedly discharged contaminated and muddy water into a nearby creek that flows into the Flint River."

https://www.atlantanewsfirst.com/2026/08/13/watchdog-group-threatens-sue-data-center-over-georgia-water-pollution/

Lithium mining is the new Gold Rush. They call it "white gold"

20 ton of poisoned earth for one gold ring

“It has been mandated by the United States government and the state of California to annihilate the California Indians since the Gold Rush. And I’m still watching it today.”
90-year-old Carmen Lucas, Kwaaymii tribe, California, protesting lithium mining
https://time.com/article/2026/08/04/critical-mining-america-photo-essay/

A standard EV uses 20 KG lithium; 40,000 liters of water

Big Tech has a 'solution' for its water use!

"While liquid cooling systems may reduce—but not eliminate—data center water use, they often rely on dangerous per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), which are highly toxic, lab-made chemicals that persist in the environment and harm many systems of the human body. Data centers are poised to increase the use of these “forever chemicals” just as some other industries are phasing them out."

https://www.foodandwaterwatch.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/FSW_2607_DataCenterPFAS.pdf

Archaeologists Keep Finding Women Where Men Were Supposed To Be

https://thenoosphere.substack.com/p/archaeologists-keep-finding-women

For thousands of years, men have systematically written women out of history.

Environmental collapse is the inevitable result of the rise of male supremacy because women have always been the guardians and protectors of nature.

Testosterone is far more dangerous than CO2

We must address core causes and the number one core cause is toxic white men.

"Black Americans are exposed to 56% more pollution than they produce. Non-hispanic white Americans are exposed to 17% less pollution than they produce."
Paul Gallay

There's a reason why Nazi Musk put his toxic AI data center in Memphis

https://capitalbnews.org/musk-xai-memphis-black-neighborhood-pollution/

Salvador Allende was killed for copper. He nationalized Chile's copper mines owned by USA oligarchs. He was made pay the price that the Global South has always had to pay to the Global North thugs, terrorists, killers

Nothing has changed. In fact, it's gotten worse

Silicon Valley-backed explorer fast-tracks one of Africa’s largest copper developments

Bill Gates is coming for the copper.

https://miningindaba.com/articles/kobold-metals-breaks-ground-on-23-billion-min

Black prisoners are assigned harsher living conditions in Ontario jails—thanks to AI

Ontario jails are using a program that claims it can predict prisoners’ behaviour, disproportionately putting Black prisoners in higher-security facilities

https://breachmedia.ca/black-prisoners-are-assigned-harsher-living-conditions-in-ontario-jails-thanks-to-ai/

This is not a flaw of AI. It's a key feature.

AI was designed to be racist.

"To have risked so much in our efforts to mold nature to our satisfaction and yet to have failed in achieving our goal would indeed be the final irony. Yet this, it seems, is our situation."

Rachel Carson

Silent Spring

1962

"During the construction of transmission lines to carry the solar power to users, transmission poles were placed very close to a labtse; a sacred site where an important mountain deity is believed to reside. When locals asked for the poles to be moved, the energy developers suggested they would cover the cost of relocating the labtse instead – which, culturally, cannot be done, and if it were would require direction from high-ranking religious figures."

https://scroll.in/article/1093579/how-tibetan-nomads-deal-with-life-amidst-chinas-giant-solar-and-wind-farms

"Solar projects throughout southern Honduras have negatively impacted the local economy and health of surrounding communities. The projects have also done little to transition the country away from fossil fuels, raising questions about who truly benefits."

“The impact so far is eerily similar to the prevailing development model in Honduras, which concentrates benefits on the rich and externalizes impacts on the poor.”

https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/in-honduras-solar-power-has-done-more-harm-than-good-communities-say/

The Green Transition?

Large swaths of old-growth Calabash trees (Crescentia cujete) were destroyed to make room for the 145.61-hectare (359.8-acre) complex, according to the report. Its location near streams, rivers and estuaries also limited access to drinking water and killed fish. Solar panels are cleaned and kept clear of weeds with harmful chemicals, residents said."

https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/in-honduras-solar-power-has-done-more-harm-than-good-communities-say/

But on Mastodon, we only see pictures of happy bees and donkeys around solar panels. Happy days!

In the USA, they hate AI so much that politicians are starting to lose their jobs over it

"The corporate pressures to grow, to continue increasing profits for shareholders and to squeeze more revenue from workers and assets keep these tech companies seeking more land on which to build more data centers."

https://fortune.com/2026/07/14/voters-ai-backlash-politicians-lose-seats/

But if a data center wants to buy land, it needs to buy the politicians first.

Summer of Ludd

“This revolution will not be televised."

"The growing anti-tech movement goes with what economists call a boomcession, an economy that looks strong on paper, with AI-driven productivity and stock prices both climbing, while many people feel worse off and watch layoffs and credit card debt climb."

https://katiesinger.substack.com/p/what-if-we-restore-limits

Why so secretive about all your water use, Big Tech?

What have you got to hide?

The Dalles spent 13 months fighting to keep Google’s water use secret — then records showed the data center campus consumed roughly a third of the Oregon city’s supply.

https://www.sfgate.com/national-parks/article/mount-hood-water-google-21307223.php

At a certain point, we have to start questioning the data.

Between 90% and 99% of data stored in an average data center is useless crap.

Useless, crap data is eating us alive, destroying everything we should actually care about.

We are destroying life on earth for useless data crap. We are feeding the AI monster to make billionaires trillionaires.

Is it worth it?

First, the data centers came for the energy. Then they came for the water.

"Tyler residents packed City Hall Tuesday as the city’s planning and zoning commission considered a proposed Bitcoin mining data center near downtown — and by the end of the meeting, neighbors got the decision they were hoping for. The commission voted 5-2 to deny a special use permit for the project proposed by Vulcan Core, which would have been built near West Erwin Street and North Ross Avenue."

https://www.aol.com/articles/tyler-commission-rejects-proposed-bitcoin-022125000.html

"You may have already heard in the news that the county I live in has about 50 data centers, and they're asking people to start conserving power. On top of that, we're being asked to start conserving water."

The woman claims temperatures could reach 120 degrees.

Residents are being asked to use less than the average 90 gallons of water they consume each day. Meanwhile, a single Virginia data center reportedly uses roughly 4 million gallons of water a day.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/us/articles/just-unplug-woman-questions-why-223000303.html

Google’s reported that its DIRECT water usage surged in 2023 by 34% year-on-year to 10.9 billion gallons (approximately 41.26 billion liters).

Neither Google nor Amazon report indirect water usage.

Meta does. It's INDIRECT water usage is 20 TIMES HIGHER than its DIRECT water usage.

Go figure

https://www.chosun.com/english/industry-en/2026/07/07/RQAGC7X4BNEYHD4IJFXKHG5Z5Q/

Lions: 90% decline in Ghana in 40 years

Forest elephants: 60% decline in 12 years

Leatherback turtles: 95% decline in 20 years

Earthworms: 33% decline in UK in 20 years

Rural hedgehog: 75% collapse since 2000

Amazon pink river dolphins: 60% wiped out in 50 years

Greater sage-grouse: 80% decline in U.S. since 1965

More than one third of tree species face extinction