The data centers that fuel AI benefit from and feed environmental racism. These centers are often built near predominantly Black neighborhoods, draining resources and, more importantly, damaging the long-term health of their residents.
Memphis, Tennessee, and West Memphis, Arkansas are two cities with large Black populations and sites of data centers. These centers release toxic fumes and need enormous amounts of water and electricity to operate. The 5400 data centers in the U.S. consume the same amount of electricity as 12.75 million homes.
These energy demands leave the power grids vulnerable. Widespread blackouts and outages are likely, especially during heat waves and whenever the demand for power exceeds the supply.
Water is another vulnerable resource. To prevent servers from overheating, the cooling system in a single data center can use up to 5 million gallons of water in a day.
Let’s call out this environmental destruction in our communities. What will it take to protect our communities?