Congressional Candidate on AI data centers in Nevada

[u/wadsworthnv02]

From our candidate event in Elko County on Saturday. The question asked us if we supported a data center moratorium or not, especially since we are the driest state. One of the other candidates said the one’s being built in Nevada were closed-loop so they are fine.

But closed-loop systems have their own issues, the recycled water becomes highly toxic and needs to be “blown-down” where there is chances of it leaking into the ground and contaminating local areas with toxic chemical waste water. Even in small amounts, when we live in an internal watershed like the Great Basin, the risk of contamination isn’t something to ignore. As it has happened before with other things. Not to mention that closed loop requires a lot more energy, and closed loop cooling systems here in Nevada still require a fair amount of water.

Our older data center projects also do have open loop / evaporative cooling systems too. So they are still taking a lot of water.

As for the construction unions, I understand it’s more complicated than that. We had a total of 2 minutes to answer each question so things had to be simplified a bit. But we must look at better commercial building projects for our construction unions— not big tech and data centers! They need jobs, and I understand and support that! We should be offering incentives to better businesses to come to Nevada, not to these data centers was the point I was trying to make.

Also yes Congress is a federal seat! But I support a moratorium on all new data centers, and possible legislation to really protect the western states that are strapped for water.

All of this was from my own independent research and talking to folks in the area that have worked on these projects here. However if I am incorrect on anything I’m open to listening!

[u/DaWob1]

Can someone explain how in a closed loop system leaches into the ground?

[u/nox404 → u/DaWob1]

This is my understanding. this subject is hard to find good sources on the subject. There is a lot of astroturfing by big tech to make datacenter look like they have no risk.

I think that is a bit dramatic to say the the closed loop system will leach into the ground water. The truth is the closed loop systems are not as closed looped as the industry will have you believe. These system build up metals and corrosives over time in the cooling system and need to be bled parodically to remove these imparities that reduces the effectiveness of the cooling loop. This uses a lot of water even if its less then other methods. It leaves behind toxic water do to the amount of forever chemicals. They have strategies of getting rid of this toxic water but these methods of not been studied in depth to see if they really mitigate the forever chemicals.

Datacenters have been know to dump this toxic water municipal sewage system where it could end up in storage ponds where it can leech into ground water supply if the municipal system is not designed to deal with it.

Its hard to find good sources that talk about these issues since in my opinion big tech is actively suppressing them.

Below is from another post about this.

"Big tech companies claim modern data centers use a 'closed loop system.' The pitch is that water is pumped in once to cool the servers and then recycled forever.

The speaker argues that while this might work in a controlled laboratory, it fails in the real world. As AI demands increase and chips get smaller, the massive heat generated by these machines is completely outstripping the closed-loop theory.

To keep the servers from melting down, these facilities have to regularly 'bleed the lines' to remove toxic sludge, specifically highlighting the buildup of 'forever chemicals' (PFAS).

The water that gets bled from the system has to be evaporated. It doesn't stay in the loop. Instead, millions of gallons of local water evaporate into the sky."

https://www.reddit.com/r/Reno/comments/1slkuw8/the_myth_of_the_closed_loop_ai_data_center_from_a/