On today’s show, host Douglas Haynes unpacks the future of AI in the state of Wisconsin. He’s in conversation with Brett Korte who describes why big tech companies are looking to Wisconsin as the future home of their data centers. Wisconsin happens to be water rich, and these data centers require water. But Korte says that Great Lakes water is governed by compacts with lots of stakeholders, making water harder to access. Korte adds that data centers require rezoning, so there’s room for community action. Nevertheless, there’s been widespread support for these centers across the political spectrum. 

Lorena Jaume-Palasí adds a European perspective on the issue, saying that these projects require large-scale logistical support, usually taken up by governments. Jaume-Palasí notes that data centers can’t use wastewater or sea water. They need potable water for cooling and that the water ultimately is highly treated with chemicals and therefore difficult to recycle. She adds that tech companies haven’t been planning for global warming and that AI companies are not considering power and water as limited resources as they build out their next generation of software. 

They also discuss nuclear energy projects, natural gas plants, and Renewable Energy Credits; but even in a world of new and unique energy demands, utilities need to rethink their approaches to serving all the load that comes to them.

Brett Korte is a Staff Attorney at Clean Wisconsin. His work focuses on air, climate, and energy issues impacting Wisconsin’s communities and environment. He works closely with the organization’s policy, science, and communications experts to advocate for healthy air, climate mitigation, and a just transition to renewable energy.

Lorena Jaume-Palasí is the Founder and Executive Director of The Ethical Tech Society, a fact- and theory-based non-profit organisation focused on the social relevance of automation and digitisation processes. Her work centres on ethics and legal philosophy, particularly in the context of artificial intelligence.

Featured image of a data center from 2013 via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0).

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