The open letter [PDF], sent to members of the US Congress by campaign group Food & Water Watch, complains that the AI-driven wave of datacenter expansion is stoking demand for more energy, which in turn leads to further greenhouse gas emissions, straining water resources, and higher electricity prices for ordinary consumers across the country. Organizations endorsing the letter collectively represent millions of citizens across all 50 US states, the group claims.
Water is a kind of archive, a kind of storehouse of memory that is, nevertheless, always in flux. Water has a clear chemical formula, but that is perhaps the only thing clear about this most fundamental of agents in the lives of people and societies.