Data centre noise is a mix of low- and high-frequency intake and exhaust fan noise at the structure level, diesel or turbine generators for the centres supplementing their own power or running backups (sometimes with cooling towers), and no real investment in sound damping.

Combine them with the tendency to build them in open, flat rural areas that have few or no trees or other buildings to baffle the sound, then run them 24/7, and it becomes a chronic issue for people who live nearby (even miles away, if the acoustics are just right).

That shouldn't have been as much of a problem in the US as it's become, but data centre projects get built near where people live because the infrastructure is already there. That naturally raised it as an issue in the UK, where there's less unpopulated space, before data centres of that scale were built: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2026/05/31/data-centre-...