Utah officials just approved a massive military-affiliated data center project, and residents who voiced concerns were shut down and told to “grow up”.
The $100 billion, 40,000-acre project called “Stratos” is being developed through a partnership with Shark Tank investor Kevin O’Leary and Utah’s Military Installation Development Authority in Box Elder County. It’s reported that the facility would support the Pentagon, the Department of Defense, and the U.S. Air Force.
The center will require 9 gigawatts of energy to operate once in full swing, which is double the state’s current electricity usage. Scientists warn the facility could generate enough concentrated heat to alter local climate patterns and accelerate the collapse of the Great Salt Lake ecosystem. One professor compared the thermal output to the equivalent of 23 atomic bombs’ worth of heat released every single day.
One concern is that nobody seems to know exactly how the project will operate. Key details remain hidden behind non-disclosure agreements and “proprietary technology” claims.
Despite the massive scale of this project and the significant risks involved, there was no environmental impact review or public input taken into consideration; instead, a quick, easy approval was given.
This isn’t an isolated incident. Data centers are setting up camp across the country, with farmland as their main target. Officials have offered farm owners upward of $26 million to sell. Some farmers are even forced to give up their land.
The pitch seems to always include jobs, innovation, and national security.
But no matter how they pitch it, two things stand out:
First, the data centers that are popping up across the nation consume enormous amounts of energy, while we’re personally pressured to conserve. So do they really care about energy use and the environment, or are they just fitting us into some type of box? And second, when farms are replaced, they’re destroying America’s food supply. It’s obvious this would lead to a manufactured food insecurity crisis, so why is this allowed, and why isn’t a moratorium put in place?
Something to think about.
Related to this, we reported on the same topic on Redacted today, and had an interesting guest who believes that data centers should be decentralized and owned by each individual citizen. What do you think of this idea to generate money from your own data instead of letting the government and big tech do it?
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