Google VP of global infrastructure says that while people's 'fears' related to data centers are legitimate, there is also a lack of information about ...

As concerns over the rapid growth of AI data centers continue to rise, Google says many public fears about water use are justified — but a lack of information is also fueling distrust. The company on June 3 unveiled a new set of guidelines that it hopes will become an industry standard for managing water consumption at data centers. As reported by Axios, the announcement comes as communities across the United States increasingly question the environmental impact of new AI infrastructure projects. Residents have raised concerns about water use, electricity demand, rising utility costs, local pollution and noise. Google says greater transparency and better industry practices can help address those worries.“There's so many data center developers, and many of them are not doing it the right way, so people's concerns are legitimate,” said Bikash Koley, vice president of global infrastructure at Google. “But there is also a lack of information, and water is one of those where lack of information always breeds distrust.”Under the new framework, Google is calling for data centers to return more water to local watersheds than they consume by 2030, avoid water-intensive cooling systems in water-stressed areas, invest in local water infrastructure and disclose water use annually.Data centers require cooling systems because AI chips generate enormous amounts of heat. According to Google, cooling happens both around the chips themselves and throughout the building. Many facilities use evaporative cooling, which relies on water to remove heat and generally consumes less electricity. Others use air cooling, which uses little or no water but requires more power.Koley said air cooling consumes about 10% more energy than evaporative cooling on average, and roughly twice as much during very hot weather."It becomes a tradeoff between reducing stress on the grid versus reducing stress on the watershed," Koley said.Google said it consumed 7.2 billion gallons of freshwater in 2024 and replenished about 4.5 billion gallons, or roughly 64% of that amount. The company said around two-thirds of its data centers currently use evaporative cooling, while the rest rely on air cooling or recycled and non-traditional water sources.Google also pointed to a recently built data center in India and facilities in the American Southwest as examples where local water conditions led the company to choose less water-intensive cooling methods.