Kalkaska County residents rally against data center and power plant at public forum
Hrmm. Not mine but ill put it here.
The latest talk of the county and Michigan in general is about the proposed AI DATA center in Kalkaska county. I've read plenty into it lately as I'm sure many of us have. I will say right off I'm against this AI Data center campus or any other in the future and here's why. These are just readily available figures that anyone can look up fyi, so I apologize in advance if my figures aren't exact. They are however very close based on available provided information thus far along with known scientific figures and formulas anyone can look up. It definitely paints an accurate and easily understood picture in my mind.
The proposal is for a roughly 1500 acre 1 gigawatt campus. Right off what jumps out to me is it's gonna be 1 gigawatt, no other Data center in the world is currently online that size as of 2025 but some are expected to be in 2026. So immediately there's a lot of uncertainty here of the true costs and long term impacts of such a large facility.
We do have factual numbers to get a good idea of what it will be like though. A 1-gigawatt (GW) AI data center could consume approximately 20 million liters (about 5.3 million gallons) of water per day, based on industry averages and projections. This is comparable to the daily water use of a town of 10,000 to 50,000 people.
A 1 GW AI data center would generate approximately 3,412,000,000 BTU/hour, that's a lot of heat not to mention the power costs. A 1-gigawatt (GW) AI data center would consume approximately 1 gigawatt of power, comparable to the needs of a city of over 800,000 people, like San Francisco. This consumption is constant for an always-on data center, meaning it would use about 24 gigawatt-hours (GWh) of energy in a 24-hour period.
Simply sated our local energy infrastructure can't support it. I can't see how a Campus AI Data center of this size can be self sufficient as claimed, unless they build a nuclear power plant or massive solar farm in conjunction with still pulling off what the wells in the ground produce combined with our local grid when needed. It's fairly obvious to me the entire area's electric and natural gas costs could be potentially heavily affected when looking at these metrics. It's just simple numbers and logic. Sorry to say the math just doesn't add up from what I see.
Lastly and perhaps most importantly to myself and many others, the environmental risks. There's potential for ecological catastrophes that would devastate the entire area of Northern Michigan if they did actually occur, for example the warming of our rivers, lowing of water tables along with ground contamination and the consequences of all that. That might not be a high priority to some in the grand scheme but that in of itself is too much of a gamble for me personally along with many others.
I understand the need for county tax revenue. I don't have exact figures but I've heard numbers like $35,000,000 per year being tossed around which is indeed significant. That revenue could definitely help the county rebuild, maintain and develop. However when I take a step back the juice just isn't worth the squeeze. The potential environmental hazards along with the potential economic fallout isn't worth it in my opinion. One final thing that I find myself guilty of sometimes, let's not demonize each other for having different viewpoints either for or against this AI DATA campus center. I say we put it to a county vote and let the people decide. Thankyou for reading this and have a great day everyone.