The public doesn't hate Net Zero as much as RW politicians insist they do

Food is probably a higher priority than data.

Reports on pollution in places like the River Wye are very concerning - that’s a complex issue involving planning & regulation and is another part of managing our water supply.

I suspect the issue re data centres is similar to golf courses - if people are having their own water supply restricted & there is a data centre / golf course / other non-essential thing with unrestricted water supply then people will resent this and become more vocal about this. That is presumably why yesterday the reporter on the BBC said that he thought the golf course exemption was untenable.

What was clear from yesterday’s phone-in was that to deal with droughts, as a country we are going to have to become much better at managing water by stopping leaks etc. One of the experts on the programme was clear that there are things that farmers can do - but they were all small things that make a difference when combined. That’s the type of detailed policy making & debate that politicians should be thinking about.

Jobs to build the data centre
Jobs to run it
Jobs in the supply chain to build and equip it

I'd rather we build them here and benefit from the job creation/safeguarding in the UK, then get income from "renting" the computer power to users from other countries.

What economic benefits exactly would those be?

IF the UK doesn't build them, then other countries will and they'll benefit from the economic benefits of the jobs, supply chains etc., with the UK paying other countries for their use!

I think it's reasonable to be worried about the current excitement over AI and apparently the need to build enormous megadata centres to.do all the AI. They do seem to be causing issues to residents in parts of America already and the projections for future energy uses are ridiculous. Plus on a selfish level they are pushing up the price of GPUs etc which is annoying.
However, whilst they are being built in the UK I am sceptical about whether the money is still going to be there to run them in a few years time. I think Labour were wrong to go all in on them. And regular (less power hungry) data centres are and will always be needed. We should also be thinking about how they are powered as we think about how all industries are powered. But they don't use so much that it makes renewables unviable.

Ignorance is bliss
Wow

Data centers in the UK use a tiny fraction of the water consumed by agriculture, with total data center public water supply withdrawal in England sitting at around 1.88 billion litres (1.88 million m³) per year, compared to UK agriculture's massive annual water footprint of over 74 billion cubic meters.

data centres are using 68% less than argriculture

Totally agree
Incredibly short sighted. On a scale beyond comparison

70% of all freshwater removals

Go on then, how much potable water do farmers use?

Rainwater that just happens to fall on the land doesn't count.

Golf courses are horrendously damaging.

Wait til you see how much farmers use (and pollute)

So a handful of leisure jobs at minimum wage is better than thousands of skilled jobs in IT which those datacentres enable ?

Listen to the sound from a data centre. The sound goes upwards as well as outwards.

Certainly not for the fish in the rivers and other associated wildlife.

"More data centers, more environmental problems?" https://www.nwf.org/Magazines/National-Wildlife/2025/Fall/Conservation/AI-Data-Centers

Data centres apparently use a lot of water. Not so good in a drought.

Data centres are bad? Since when? Solar energy (in the right place is good)

Golf courses were mentioned on the Radio 5 phone-in on drought & wildfires this morning.

Apparently, golf courses are exempt from hose-pipe bans (something I wasn’t aware of before listening). The reporter didn’t think this was tenable in the long term.

There was also discussion of the pressure the fire service was under with the current wildfires & how we are moving towards a flood / drought climate what this means for farmers & for us (more expense as more water storage will be needed).

It was really interesting stuff & exactly the type of stuff politicians both local & national need to be focusing on.

Today’s report about the wildfires have been absolutely awful & it must be so frightening to be caught up in it.

I’d rather have the golf courses, at least they are green and have some community functions and job opportunities

Golf courses use far more water and land than data centres and solar farms.

Silence from the boomers. Why ?

Yes I think they are a worry

i would rather farming was prioritised

Thank you, totally agree

So what's the point of thrashing industries even more

The giant AI data centres will make very good laswr tag venues in a few years time after the bubble pops. If they get built at all.

How much of a carbon footprint and environmental impact are the massive AI/data centres going to make, given that they use millions of gallons of water for cooling and Gigawatts of electricity?
Are they all going to be solar and wind powered I wonder?
How will net zero be achieved then?

Given that it’s less than 1% of global output, it’s not much, is it?