Meta 回应数据中心三大质疑：水耗、电费与就业

The world of technology is full of myths and legends. That’s understandable when most of the technology we rely on operates completely behind the scenes. Recently, I’ve been hearing a lot of talk around data centers, and many of the “facts” I’m hearing aren’t quite as true as some people believe.

Today, I want to address some of these myths, not to create division or try to win an argument, but instead to inform and clear up some misconceptions that are quite common within the conversation of technology and AI at the moment.

Myth #1: Data Centers Use Too Much Water and Take it Away From the Public

Water is a huge topic of discussion around data centers at the moment, but very few people actually know how data centers use water for cooling. I can’t speak for all data centers, but I can speak about the two types of Meta data centers that I have visited over the past few months.

1. A traditional air-cooled compute data center: These facilities use water for only a few months of the year to cool down air as it passes into the building.
2. An AI-optimized closed-loop liquid cooled data center: These facilities circulate a water and glycol mixture around a closed-loop system, meaning that the cooling loop is sealed, so water isn’t consumed as it circulates, passing the cold liquid over the server hardware until it gets warm, then sending it over to the heat rejection system. The heat rejection system cools the liquid and then sends it back to the servers in a continuous loop. I visited an infra lab to take a deeper look at liquid cooling and saw first-hand how this closed-loop system recirculates water in a sealed loop, using very little on an ongoing basis.

So where does the water come from? The two sites I visited pulled from different places — one off the municipal system, one from a permitted on-site well. In both cases the withdrawal is permitted, metered, and counted in the local water plan, not carved out of it. The well case was the one that surprised me: the aquifer being tapped wasn’t suitable for drinking water in the first place. And in genuinely water-stressed regions, the closed-loop design I described above is the default, precisely because it barely consumes any water.

As mentioned, I can’t speak for all data center operators, but these two efficient cooling methods and the associated water usage mean that many of Meta’s data center facilities use less water annually than an average US golf course will in the same amount of time.

Myth #2: More Data Centers Mean Higher Energy Bills for Consumers

It’s no secret that data centers do use a lot of energy, but the assumption that data center energy use automatically means higher energy bills is not true.

Meta pays the full cost of their energy bills, just like any household would. But they go a step further by also directly paying for new and upgraded infrastructure needed to supply that additional energy to the data center.

The important distinction here is that Meta doesn’t simply connect a huge data center to the grid and leave the local community to deal with the consequences. They work with the utility providers years before facilities come online to plan for demand, design new infrastructure, get it installed, and make sure it is able to meet their requirements before a facility goes online. In Louisiana, for example, Meta’s agreement with Entergy is structured so the data center pays for the new generation and transmission it requires, with protections written in so existing customers aren’t left holding the cost.

Myth #3: Data Centers Don’t Create Jobs

The important thing to remember here is that data centers don’t build themselves, and they definitely don’t run themselves. There are two stages in a data center’s lifecycle that create many jobs for local communities.

Construction

During construction, thousands of skilled trades are employed to help build the facility on site, with many thousands of jobs being supported through the purchasing of equipment through different suppliers during the construction process. These are also multi-year construction projects and often are extended when facilities are expanded or retrofitted.

Operation

As I mentioned earlier, data centers do not run themselves. They still need highly skilled engineers, technicians, IT professionals, security personnel, and more to keep the facilities maintained and operating smoothly.

In many of the communities where Meta operates data centers, they are among the biggest local employers. Earlier this year, Meta also launched America’s Workforce Academy, a free program designed to train people for careers in the skilled trades with a guaranteed job at a Meta-partner site upon completion.

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