In New Jersey, a new data center under construction is a case in point.

The AI infrastructure firm Nebius Group, based in the Netherlands, is building a gigantic new data center in Cumberland County, New Jersey.

According to the Staten Island Advance the project will result in "six 220,000-square-foot buildings to house servers and computing equipment, according to approved site plans. A four-story office building and parking garage is also planned."

The Advance notes that the data center will span a total of 2.6 million square feet when finished. For perspective, that's just under 60 acres.

Water and Energy Consumption

AI data centers may be visible, but the impact on energy and water resources is often overlooked. Nonetheless, these are substantial, and they are putting both electrical grid capacity at risk and well as raising concerns about municipal water supplies.

These questions were addressed on July 29 by civil and environmental engineering associate professor Landon Marston at Virginia Tech. 

"The primary driver for energy consumption is the IT equipment itself, Marston told Virginia Tech News. "The second major driver is cooling. All that electronic equipment generates a tremendous amount of heat, and data centers must run massive cooling systems to keep servers from overheating. AI-specific servers are especially power-hungry because of the intense calculations they perform."

In just a few years, AI energy consumption nearly doubled in just one year. According to MIT News, "the power requirements of data centers in North America increased from 2,688 megawatts at the end of 2022 to 5,341 megawatts at the end of 2023." 

At Virginia Tech, Marston described the water requirements for cooling for just a single large data center.

"Many large data centers use evaporative cooling, which is very effective but can sometimes consume as much water as a small city.”

There are many questions about the viability of rapid AI development. Most of these have been questions of economics and labor, specifically the impact on employment this already being felt in the form of thousands of AI backed job reductions. 

In addition, however, the hidden costs of destabilizing the electrical grid, driving up the price of electricity and stressing water supplies that are already under pressure in many areas, present serious concerns that local citizens, farmers and officials will need to grapple with if AI is going to grow in a way that is broadly beneficial as opposed to catastrophically destructive.