61
submitted 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) by themachinestops@lemmy.dbzer0.com to c/technology@lemmy.world

The Stratos artificial intelligence datacenter footprint will cover more than 40,000 acres (62 sq miles) over three sites in Box Elder county in north-western Utah. The facility will require about 9GW of power, which is more than the entire state of Utah currently consumes, and suck up a significant amount of water in an area that has been hit by severe drought in recent years.

top 42 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[-] Fredselfish@lemmy.world 9 points 1 week ago

No backlash unless they are dragging the council members out of their homes.

[-] KC_Royalz@lemmy.world 9 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Which honestly needs to happen. Those council members should be fearing for their lives everytime they go outside. But Oleary probably gave them a fat paycheck so they will no longer have to live in the area.

[-] Malyca@lemmy.zip 1 points 1 week ago

They shouldn't be able to have dinner in peace

Gonna be a cool liminal space in the next 5 years when this inevitably fails and gets abandoned

[-] ChaosSpectre@lemmy.zip 3 points 1 week ago

My money is on Ikea acquiring the leftovers to easily set up new locations lol

[-] KairuByte@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 1 week ago

You mean Costco, à la Idiocracy?

[-] BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.cafe 9 points 1 week ago

All those shithole Red states are going to get raped by data centers, while the Blue states will force them to pay their way.

[-] snapoff@sh.itjust.works 7 points 1 week ago

It’s not that black and white (or red and blue as the case may be). I live in a blue state that is also selling out to data centers under the guise of “job creation”.

[-] this_1_is_mine@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 week ago

Make them quantify jobs that they are creating

[-] 00xide@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 week ago

They do quantify them. There's been counters for that. The people speak out against them at town halls. It still goes up.

[-] MushuChupacabra@piefed.world 8 points 1 week ago

Those data centers are jam packed with copper, and have far less security per kg than you'd think.

Lots and lots of RAM kicking around too, if you're a little short.

[-] modus@lemmy.world 3 points 1 week ago

Is it even the type of RAM peasants like me are interested in?

[-] FauxLiving@lemmy.world 6 points 1 week ago

That depends, are you interested in money?

[-] Burninator05@lemmy.world 7 points 1 week ago
[-] FauxLiving@lemmy.world 5 points 1 week ago

I can't believe you like money too. We should hang out.

[-] Zron@lemmy.world 2 points 1 week ago

Remember your LOTO before you snip the wires

[-] panda_abyss@lemmy.ca 5 points 1 week ago

Why are they building these things in dry hot places, surely the one time real estate cost can’t dwarf all the other issues?

[-] The_Picard_Maneuver@lemmy.world 8 points 1 week ago

That's long-term thinking. I assume it's like a ponzi scheme: everyone who puts money into something like this thinks they'll cash out before the problems occur.

Why do I feel like the ones left holding the bag are going to be the taxpayers/residents somehow?

[-] crusa187@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 week ago

~~E Pluribus Unum~~

Privatize the gains, Socialize the losses.

[-] belochka@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

If I were justifying my account name, I'd suppose, for the purpose of future appearing interesting, this might be a coverup.

Such a structure is useful for many things, and while a DC doesn't have to be that big, a factory producing real things on scale or mass housing or a prepared company town all benefit from being in one place.

So perhaps it's being built as a DC, but in fact is going to be like a drone factory, or something equally dystopian-futuristic.

Or a humongous supercomputer, whatever.

I'm starting to think along plot lines of science fiction and space operas I've seen and read before, they were saying it's harmful for my development, I didn't believe them.

Another option - it's, yes, a scheme and it won't get built. Just pump and dump.

Nobody is thinking this shit through long-term or short.

[-] IHeartBadCode@fedia.io 2 points 1 week ago

It's located on the Ruby Pipeline which will serve as the primary source of energy in the short term. Additionally, the data center being classified as a national security site, is located near the Utah Test and Training Range.

Longer term the facility is looking at nuclear facilities for power and the possibility for a runway and aviation facilities.

The primary customer of this facility will be the United States military.

[-] GreenBeard@lemmy.ca 2 points 1 week ago

This. US military is the target market. That people live there, that humans need water to live, and that powering this is going to entirely erase the local agriculture and wider ecosystems are all irrelevant. Deus Vult.~

[-] redsand@infosec.pub 1 points 1 week ago

This is also why Utah. They will staff it with mormons and have fiber runs already

[-] ThomasWilliams@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago

Corrosion and mould are more of a problem than cooling.

[-] KC_Royalz@lemmy.world 5 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Nearly 4,000 people have lodged objections to the project being approved, with this pushback leading to contentious public meetings that Lee Perry, the Box Elder county commissioner, said have left him feeling “physically sick” amid alleged death threats and false accusations.

Good

[-] vathecka@lemmy.radio 2 points 1 week ago

"waaahhh death threats" is the usual retort whenever someone gets deserved criticism. Maybe try not doing things that make your constituents want to kill you?

[-] IrateAnteater@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 week ago

To be fair, there are a lot of unhinged people who resort to actual death threats for shit that in no way deserves that level of intensity. It's probably one of the big reasons why everyone who's actually smart enough to run a city/state/country is also smart enough not to.

[-] NotMyOldRedditName@lemmy.world 4 points 1 week ago

Wtf would you even want to make something that big.

Thats a huge geographic vulnerability. You could still make huge ones but spread it out.

[-] Insekticus@aussie.zone 5 points 1 week ago

Greed. That's the entirety of the answer.

Whoever ticks and flicks these data centres is paid with grotesque amounts of money to approve this shit and to deal with the fallout.

[-] hushable@lemmy.world 4 points 1 week ago
[-] belochka@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago

If that's going to be one humongous superstructure, zoned inside, then if this fails, they might get a new city. Superstructures like this are nice, just nobody usually builds them (after 50s and 60s, I suppose) for residential areas.

One can repurpose the space for multi-story apartments (I suppose ceilings will be much higher than needed), or malls, or literally everything.

Or factories, if there are problems with exporting orders to southeast Asia.

If this even gets built.

Or if it doesn't fail, then heat and noise pollution, I suppose. And grid load. Not nice.

[-] cabillaud@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago

That's astonishing. How many servers will be running in that thing? Billions? Am I missing something?

[-] Warl0k3@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago

Zero servers are ever gonna run in this thing, it's just... even more obvious than with all the other fucking absued data center proposals.

[-] anon_8675309@lemmy.world 3 points 1 week ago

Okay. How is Mr Wonderful actually going to pay for this?

[-] MajorasTerribleFate@lemmy.zip 2 points 1 week ago

High-royalty, low-equity that sounds better than it is.

[-] nomadman@piefed.social 1 points 1 week ago

It would be a shame if the builders had to restart their work every day...

[-] Medic8eme@piefed.ca 1 points 1 week ago

Who was really driving the boat Kevin?

[-] Greyghoster@aussie.zone 0 points 1 week ago

Apparently this will show the Chinese! Is this all about who has the biggest dong?

[-] Andonyx@lemmy.world 2 points 1 week ago

No, it's about who has the MOST dong, and that's obviously Vietnam.

[-] UltraGiGaGigantic@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 week ago

Context: the currency Vietnam uses is named Dong.

this post was submitted on 13 May 2026
61 points (100.0% liked)

Technology

84891 readers
1852 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.


Our Rules


  1. Follow the lemmy.world rules.
  2. Only tech related news or articles.
  3. Be excellent to each other!
  4. Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
  5. Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
  6. Politics threads may be removed.
  7. No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
  8. Only approved bots from the list below, this includes using AI responses and summaries. To ask if your bot can be added please contact a mod.
  9. Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
  10. Accounts 7 days and younger will have their posts automatically removed.

Approved Bots


founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS