It is worth remembering that it heavily depends on cooling system involved.

Traditional data centers have far smaller power density per rack and thus cooling requirements than AI datacenters; if you can use closed loop system without evaporation, water usage is very small. Difference is around order of magnitude

But if you want to fit maximum amount of compute in the space and need to dissipate it, evaporative based system will be far more effective space wise; especially if also for some reason you built it in hot place, rather than somewhere in the north

I've been spending some time in Tasmania, Aus for the last few weeks and have been following the local debate regarding 3 data centres Firmus is planning on building here.

While on the surface, the proposals sound very efficient and low impact, as always the devil is in the details.

Standard operation would use closed loop cooling, relying on rooftop rain water to keep the loops topped up. However, the company has acknowledged that when ambient temperatures rise above a certain level (26C), they would need to switch to evaporative cooling.

The contract with the government also has a section where the company requires a connection to the state agricultural water supply as a backup [1].

When rainfall is plentiful and temperatures are low, as they often are in tasmania, everything is rosy.

However the state does experience periods of draught and thats where things get sketchy. Conflicts are likely to arise when a large investor in the states economy wants to start draining the local water supply to keep ai agents running at a time when crops and livestock are competing for the same resources.

Similar issues would arise regarding power. Firmus is proposing to underwrite an expansion of the states already extensive Hydro power network, but for that investment they would very likely expect priority access to the grid when supplies start running low.

[1] https://www.tasmaniancountry.com/newspaper/tasmanian-country...