Try living next to a constant 80-100 dB hum 24x7. You’d not be complaining about people being irrational.

kube-system 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

That depends highly on the datacenter. While a huge hyperscaler might be noisy, many datacenters are quiet enough that people don’t even know they’re there.

The one I host at, you can’t hear from the end of the parking lot. The coolers aren’t any noisier than the ones on other commercial buildings. These kinds of datacenters are everywhere and most people probably just think they are warehouse or office building.

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bruce511 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I'm sure there are data centers that make a noise. And if you're firing up a generator that's a separate issue.

But the noise from computer fans and power supplies is easy to ameliorate and can be a trivial permit requirement.

The noise is all high-frequency which means most anything will stop it. Frankly building an earth berm around the site would kill all the noise and make it better to look at. Throw in some trees and you're done.

I get the water and power concerns. But (in the right locations) both are solvable. Power can be balanced with power generation (off site) especially solar and wind. Water isn't really "used" it's just necessary as a heat-sink so as long as it's available it can stay available.

Yes, govt should write permits carefully. And there are locations it is not suitable. But opposition to data centers in general is just hype.

	▲	kube-system 2 hours ago \| parent \| next [-]
		Absolutely zero noise from any datacenter comes from the fans or power supplies of the equipment inside of it. The equipment is inside of the building. Datacenter noise comes from the chiller units.
	▲	lovich 3 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		> The noise is all high-frequency which means most anything will stop it. Frankly building an earth berm around the site would kill all the noise and make it better to look at. Throw in some trees and you're done. Have any of these data centers done this? All the ones I’ve seen haven’t even put up a sound baffling wall. If a data center’s owner has taken steps to ameliorate or completely prevent their negative externalities then opposition to them definitely looks like NIMBYism. If, however, you’re just saying they _could_ prevent the problems, but then never do, I’m even more inclined to support the people telling them to fuck off.