One HUGE issue is that datacenters don't have an afterlife in the communities where they're located.

They add to the Rust Belt once their lifetimes end, contrast this with old brick warehouses which were eventually repurposed as homes and offices.

If they were built with a bit of thought around what happens once they depreciate completely and they're abandoned/sold for residual value they wouldn't be as despised.

Current construction completely ignores the nearby communities present and future development.

It’s just a big tip-up warehouse with precast walls. If you stripped out all of the extra electrical distribution and cooling equipment, you’re left with a giant warehouse which can easily be repurposed.

If the ai bubble bursts, these buildings will be able to be repurposed unlike rust belt factories. With all of that cooling, you could turn them into a weird form of multi-family housing. Or use them for indoor skate pars, kart racing tracks, whatever you can imagine. I don't think rust belt is an appropriate comparison. Also, these places don't hire that many people like a factory did. If the factory shut down, entire towns could collapse with it. If a data center shut down, maybe 20 people would notice????

> Current construction completely ignores the nearby communities present and future development.

The issue is an incentive one, for the companies involved in the construction.

Right now, they are getting paid so much to build it fast. Time is of the greatest importance. Nothing else is mattering to anyone involved except how fast datacenters are being built. At best, this is an after-thought.

As such, I believe that we have to change the incentives to create more sustainability but it requires time, discussion. Perhaps laws can help in making them more sustainable but currently, the sad reality is that for all the parties actually involved, I don't think that many truly care about the after-math or repurcussions of it as much as its the only thing that they want right now