Notices by Gerry McGovern (gerrymcgovern@mastodon.green), page 2

"While debates rage about AI’s potential to outsmart humans or take over jobs, a more immediate threat is quietly unfolding. The rapid expansion of data centers, which power AI systems, is contributing to a significant increase in air pollution. This pollution, often overlooked in discussions about AI’s risks, poses a serious danger to public health."

https://farmingdale-observer.com/2025/01/05/ai-threatens-our-lives-not-reason-you-think-hidden-danger-revealed/

In the US, datacenters can consume anywhere between 300,000 and four million gallons of water a day.

By 2027 global AI demand could account for the withdrawal of 4.2-6.6 billion cubic meters of water annually. That's roughly the equivalent of half the UK's water withdrawal over the course of a year.

Evaporating ten gallons a minute is enough to cool roughly 1.5 megawatts of compute.

Even though we have a global water crisis, data center water is super cheap.

https://www.theregister.com/AMP/2025/01/04/how_datacenters_use_water/

“The amount of water needed per semiconductor wafer manufactured increased from 133.4 L per 12 inch equivalent wafer to to 176.4 L per 12 inch equivalent wafer (an increase of 32 percent.”

https://electronicplanet.xyz/2025/01/04/is-net-positive-water-a-thing/

Every year, chips become more toxic, more energy and water intense, and less recyclable. Welcome to the world of Big Tech.

“Humans are accepting the humiliating condition of consuming the earth … the will of capital is to impoverish existence. Capitalism wants a grim and monotonous world where we operate like robots. We cannot accept that.”
Ailton Krenak
Ancestral Future

Ecocide Google

“In 2023, Google imposed “expiration dates” on Chromebooks, restricting the length of time they’ll support these devices, even if the hardware remains perfectly functional. This year, Google will cease support for 13 Chromebook models. Next year, 51 more will join the list of unsupported devices. This essentially forces users to retire their Chromebooks, even though many are still in good working order.”

https://fernandinaobserver.com/stories/the-reality-of-chromebooks-as-disposable-computers,41669

The absolute horrors of AI

“And the only results on the entire internet for those questions were AI generated lies, which are perfectly composed, sound factual, but use the names of real organisms in completely made-up ways, saying that the rainbow boa, which is a real snake, is vegetarian, which it is not. Or that a long list of plants are edible bromeliads when they're neither edible nor bromeliads.”

https://www.wbur.org/onpoint/2024/12/31/ai-content-humanity-neuroscience-digital

Land change and water have a much bigger impact on climate than C02

75% of Earth’s land surface has been significantly altered. 85% of wetlands are gone. Between 2010 and 2015, over 123,000 square miles of primary forest were lost.

“Land change has had the largest relative negative impact on Nature since 1970.”

https://theclimateaccordingtolife.substack.com/p/are-ecology-and-climate-the-same

“Data centers in the United States are consuming so much power that they may be impacting the flow of electricity to millions of Americans. AI data centers are sprouting up across the country to meet the increased demand for AI, but they're also sucking up the power on which millions of Americans rely.”

https://www.yahoo.com/news/ai-data-centers-making-electricity-195931467.html

“The most investment on AI data centers is being done by Microsoft, with most spent on GPUs($20 billion) and other AI spend ($20 billion) which makes total capex of $40 billion. The cost spent on training and R&D by Microsoft is $3 billion, cost on inference is $3 billion which makes total operating cost of $6 billion. This makes a total of $46 billion that Microsoft is spending on AI data centers.”

https://www.digitalinformationworld.com/2024/12/the-hidden-cost-of-innovation-how-tech.html

“As Investigate West reported, the scammers took over a 140-year-old newspaper called the Ashland Daily Tidings. This newspaper was once a legitimate news source but closed operations in 2023. Artificial intelligence invaders have been emerging onto local news scenes, with websites hiding who is producing them. They are impersonating actual reporters and spreading misinformation driven by advertising dollars.”

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/residents-stunned-after-140-year-old-community-staple-is-replaced-by-ai-its-maddening/ar-AA1wB61H

The horror of AI: Part 63,345

“Last year, a human rights and environmental watchdog group determined that 177 land defenders were killed in 2022. Land defenders are people who seek to protect their communities and environmental resources from destructive development projects ranging from pipelines to mines to farms to wind projects.”

https://ictnews.org/news/study-indigenous-land-defenders-more-likely-to-be-attacked-than-others

“Data centres in the United States could consume up to 12% of the country’s electricity by 2028 due to the rapid growth of AI, according to a new report. The Department of Energy-backed study predicts energy usage from data centres will rise from 4% to between 6.7% and 12%, depending on GPU availability and demand.”

https://dig.watch/updates/ai-boom-could-triple-us-data-centre-power-demand

Data centers pour fuel on the flames of environmental collapse

“OpenAI is pursuing an ambitious plan to construct massive 5-gigawatt (GW) data centers across various locations in the United States. This initiative aims to support the growing demands of artificial intelligence (AI) processing, which requires substantial computational power. At what price to the energy grid do you suppose?”

https://www.ai-supremacy.com/p/note-to-our-energy-sucking-overlords

Growth Death Cult goes full throttle. Tech bros accelerating for extinction.

“The flux of information processed by living cells is about (EF/kTE ) ~ 2 x 1020 operations per second per square meter. Compare this with a typical modern supercomputer, which consumes a hundred times more power per square meter but performs a billion times fewer operations per second.”
ANASTASSIA MAKARIEVA

https://bioticregulation.substack.com/p/information-processing-by-natural

@jk That is indeed true and they are superbly adapted to their environment over hundreds of thousands of years and more. However, those who came out of Africa to Europe faced a new environment and new diseases, so getting Neanderthal genes helped. It's nice that they came out cooperating rather than conquering and genociding, as was the previous story we were told. The idea that early humans were simply cruel killing machines is more disproved as science progresses.

“Each o3 task consumes approximately 1,785 kWh of energy, equivalent to the electricity used by an average US household over two months. The analysis of benchmark results done by Boris Gamazaychikov, AI sustainability lead at Salesforce, says that it roughly translates to 684 kilograms of CO₂ equivalent (CO₂e) emissions, which is comparable to the carbon emissions from more than five full tanks of petrol. “

https://analyticsindiamag.com/ai-news-updates/openai-o3-consumes-five-tanks-of-gas-per-task/

How Pacific resistance to seabed mining is growing amid neocolonial fears
https://www.teaonews.co.nz/2024/12/20/how-pacific-resistance-to-seabed-mining-is-growing-amid-neocolonial-fears/

It's not enough to destroy the land with mining. To get our precious "green" metals, they now want to wipe out life in the deep seas. How have we come to this?

The data centers are coming for your electricity and water

DOE: Data centers consumed 4.4% of US power in 2023, could hit 12% by 2028

"Electricity consumption of US data centers is currently growing at an accelerating rate."

https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/doe-data-centers-consumed-44-of-us-power-in-2023-could-hit-12-by-2028/

Destroying life on earth for crappy data.

AI Data Centers Threaten Global Water Security

"Data centers are water guzzlers, and many countries are currently expanding their data center footprints while ignoring potential water risks. This trend has already resulted in increased water scarcity in several regions, posing heightened social, political, and ecological risks."

https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/ai-data-centers-threaten-global-water-security

Wake up, before it's too late, to the direct and imminent threat AI poses to life on this planet. Don't let greedy tech bros dominate.

"Texas is a microcosm of the threat artificial intelligence poses to the world—lack of energy security for households, an accelerating climate crisis, and the consolidation of corporate power. It is estimated that new AI servers that will be sold in 2027 will consume between 85 and 134 terawatt-hours annually. This is comparable to the electricity consumption of 18 million people living in the Netherlands."

https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/big-tech-ai-ruin-planet