Tom Shaw, a software developer and content creator, discusses three common ideas about data centers, focusing on facilities operated by Meta that he visited. The author emphasizes that the examples do not represent all data center operators, but they illustrate how some cooling, power, and operations technologies work in the company’s facilities.
Water Consumption Depends on Cooling Design
Shaw describes two types of Meta data centers. The first relies on air cooling and uses water during several months of the year to cool the air entering the building. The second, designed for artificial intelligence workloads, uses a closed-loop liquid-cooling system in which a mixture of water and glycol circulates around the servers, is then cooled again, and sent back to the equipment in a continuous cycle.
According to the author, he visited two sites, one of which obtains water from the municipal network, while the other relies on an on-site, permitted well. He says the withdrawals are licensed, measured, and included in local water plans. He also notes that the groundwater used in the case of the well was not potable, and that the closed-loop design is used by default in areas experiencing water stress because it limits continuous consumption.
Meta says that a number of its data centers consume less water annually than the average golf course in the United States. The text does not provide detailed comparative data or an independent methodology for verifying this estimate.
Energy Does Not Automatically Mean Higher Bills
Shaw acknowledges that data centers consume large amounts of energy, but rejects an automatic link between this consumption and higher customer bills. He says that Meta pays the energy costs and also funds the new or upgraded infrastructure needed to supply it.
According to the article, the company works with utility providers years before facilities become operational to estimate demand and design and install the infrastructure. The example from Louisiana refers to an agreement with Entergy stating, according to Meta, that the data center will pay the costs of the new generation and transmission capacity it requires, while including protections to prevent existing customers from bearing those costs.
Data Centers Require Specialized Labor
The author bases his rebuttal of the third idea on two main phases. During the construction phase, projects employ thousands of workers in skilled trades, in addition to jobs supported by equipment purchases from suppliers. The work usually continues for years and may expand when facilities are added or upgraded.
After operations begin, the centers need engineers, technicians, information technology specialists, security personnel, and others to maintain the equipment and manage operations. Meta says that some of its centers are among the largest local employers in the communities where they are located.
Why Does This Argument Matter?
The article shows that a data center’s impact is not limited to servers, but also includes cooling systems, electricity networks, and the local labor market. However, the argument remains a defense presented by the company itself; it does not provide an independent comparison between Meta’s facilities and those of other operators, nor does it discuss the details of each project’s impact on water or the electrical grid at its location. Therefore, the examples help explain the mechanisms, but they are not sufficient on their own to generalize the findings to the data center sector as a whole.
The article also mentions that Meta launched a free program earlier in the year called America's Workforce Academy to train people for skilled-trade jobs, with a guaranteed position at a Meta partner site after completing the program.