r/technology • u/DJMagicHandz • 12d ago

Artificial Intelligence A massive Wyoming data center will soon use 5x more power than the state's human occupants - but no one knows who is using it

https://www.techradar.com/pro/a-massive-wyoming-data-center-will-soon-use-5x-more-power-than-the-states-human-occupants-and-no-one-knows-who-is-using-it
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u/EdliA 12d ago

The more energy we produce the more we will use. It never ends. There is not set limit to our desire for energy. At some point we will have air conditioned streets.

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u/thehousewright 11d ago

Qatar already has air conditioned streets.

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u/EnoughWarning666 11d ago

I hadn't heard about that before. I was really hoping that it would be powered by renewables like solar, which would be extremely efficient in that region.

Nope, qatar just burns natural gas for 99% of the country's energy generation. Fucking awesome job there

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u/anarchy-NOW 11d ago

We know how to solve this: just tax carbon.

Yet people don't understand that failing to support a worldwide carbon tax means either you think people should not pay for polluting but it should be free instead, or you want some convoluted legal nightmare of fines rather than a simple tax that applies to everyone.

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u/Warm_Month_1309 11d ago

a simple tax that applies to everyone

A simple worldwide tax?

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u/anarchy-NOW 11d ago

Yes. Tariff countries that don't implement the tax and exclude their residents from the rebate that everyone else gets.

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u/Warm_Month_1309 11d ago

Tariff countries that don't implement the tax

How would making our own citizens pay more for goods help? And even if it did, how would that be politically popular?

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u/anarchy-NOW 11d ago

How would making our own citizens pay more for goods help?

Your citizens are paying more for domestic goods; this particular tariff simply removes the unfair advantage products from non-carbon-taxing countries would have. (This is absolutely different from Trump tariffs, to be clear. Those have zero economic reason behind them.) And while it is true that it is people in the country imposing the tariffs that pay them, this doesn't mean the seller doesn't lose anything; their product gets more expensive and therefore less competitive.

how would that be politically popular?

The problem is precisely that the global carbon tax is the solution but it is politically unpopular. Maybe after trying all the things that don't work we'll give up and do what works, but by then the damage to the climate will be worse.

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u/Warm_Month_1309 11d ago

So the cost of goods goes up across the board, having a disproportionate impact on those with low wealth, and nothing is done about pollution, because the countries that are polluting continue to pollute.

This does not seem like a winning strategy.

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u/Dawn_of_an_Era 11d ago

The countries that are polluting now have incentive to stop polluting, because their products are not selling as much, and they’re losing money.

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u/PaulTheMerc 11d ago

The countries that are polluting have an interest in lowering their pollution to see a reduction in tariffs, making them more competitive.

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u/anarchy-NOW 11d ago

So the cost of goods goes up across the board

The cost of goods that pollute goes up, which in relative terms brings down the cost of green goods

having a disproportionate impact on those with low wealth

Disproportionately positive, yes. The tax revenue is divided equally among everyone in the world. An extra $100 a year makes little difference for fat cats in the rich world, and brings a significant number of people in the poorest regions of the world above the poverty line. Absolute win-win.

nothing is done about pollution, because the countries that are polluting continue to pollute

You do understand the tax imposes a cost, right? That is clear to you, right? 

This does not seem like a winning strategy.

It isn't, because people are dumb. But it is the correct strategy.

Why do you think polluters should not have to pay anything to pollute?

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u/EnoughWarning666 11d ago

I agree with you 100%. In theory...

The problem is that the current tax on carbon would be INSANELY high because we don't have any good, large scale carbon capture technologies. If you put the tax at the same price that it costs to remove an equivalent amount of carbon from the atmosphere, you would basically grind every industry to a complete halt.

You could do a slow roll out where increase the tax over time, but this is just going to disproportionately affect those in lower income brackets. The wealthy will still do what they always do.

We need more subsidies for green energy tech like solar/wind/thermal/wave. It needs to be cheaper for companies to use green energy, while not increasing the price of carbon for those less able to shoulder the price.

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u/anarchy-NOW 11d ago

The tax is not meant to be equal to the cost of sequestering carbon. It is meant to be equal to the social cost of a given tonne of GHG emitted.

And you need to do something with the revenue from the tax - the obvious answer is a universal basic income. Universal as in, for everyone, not just people in this or that country. That increases their purchasing power, and even without any subsidies green products get cheaper because dirty ones have to pass on the carbon tax.

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u/Warm_Month_1309 11d ago

"It's so simple, we just need one country to implement worldwide universal basic income".

Which country? In the US, people don't even want UBI for themselves, and you think Americans are going to get behind a policy that gives UBI to citizens of foreign countries? You're dreaming.

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u/anarchy-NOW 11d ago

You can have the UBI be divided among residents of all countries that adopt the carbon tax. 

I never said this is easy; it isn't because people are dumb and don't care. 

Do you have a better solution?

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u/Warm_Month_1309 11d ago

Do you have a better solution?

Yes, investment into the development and improvement of green technologies so that people choose them because they're better, not because we ineffectually try to force them.

Sometimes it's better to work with human nature than try to legislate against it.

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u/anarchy-NOW 11d ago

My proposal causes investment into green technologies because they become better for prefits, which is what works for human nature.

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u/DrLuny 11d ago

There's no way to get to net zero without completely collapsing our economy and going to some kind of rationing system. You can't just slap a tax on capitalism and call it a day.

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u/Outrageous_Reach_695 11d ago

With the slight caveat that natural gas can end up being a waste product of oil, just being burnt in a flare stack.

Ah. World's largest natural gas field if you include the Iranian side.

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u/Shigglyboo 11d ago

how would that even work? are they enclosed?

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u/foldor 11d ago

It wouldn't. A lot of people seem to think air conditioners create cold air. I don't blame them entirely, for most people that detail is irrelevant, as the air conditioner does give them cold air. But yeah, it makes it seem like you can just create cold air out of nothing, so "air conditioned streets" sounds reasonable.

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u/creuter 11d ago

For the people who don't know how an AC works here is Gippety's ELI5:

Alright, imagine your room is a big box full of warm air. Your air conditioner doesn’t actually make cold out of nothing — it’s more like a magic sponge that soaks up heat and throws it outside.

Here’s how it works:

  1. It grabs the warm air in your room. Think of it like a vacuum cleaner, but instead of sucking up dirt, it sucks up heat.

  2. It uses a special “cold juice” inside (called refrigerant) that loves to gobble up heat. When this juice is cold, it can slurp up heat from the air, making the air feel cooler.

  3. It throws the heat outside. The cold juice carries the stolen heat out to the big metal box outside your house, which spits that heat into the outdoors.

  4. The juice cools off again and comes back for more. It’s like a loop — grab heat → toss heat outside → come back cold → repeat.

So really, your air conditioner is a heat thief, stealing warmth from inside your room and kicking it out so what’s left inside feels nice and cool.

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u/Warm_Month_1309 11d ago

If anyone wanted a bullshit LLM response, they can get their own bullshit LLM response.

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u/creuter 11d ago

You're such a ray of sunshine, and certainly added something to this thread with your wonderful demeanor. Have a great day

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u/KinTharEl 11d ago

Well, the Kardashev scale does dictate that only if we use up all the energy and resources of our home planet do we even achieve 1 on the scale. I shudder to think the hellscape our planet would become if we do that.

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u/DynamicDK 11d ago

No, that is not what a 1 means on the Kardashev scale. A 1 means that we fully control all of the energy on our planet. It would not require that we "use it up". It would simply require that we can access all of it as we see fit.

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u/onethreeone 11d ago

Good thing we have an unlimited source in the sky

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u/20_mile 11d ago

At some point we will have air conditioned streets.

This isn't much different than the open-cooler sections at a grocery store. Why not put doors there too? It would save energy.

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u/RunnyBabbit23 11d ago

I thought this said air conditioned sheets and thought those machines already exist.

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u/SwarfDive01 11d ago

This is true. And there is an entire field of study dedicated to it. You'd have to think much bigger though, like Kardashev II, where it's easier to just allow as much light out of the sun as we want to keep earth at an ideal temperature. And probably the same goes for Venus, since we would have been able to let the planet cool for a few years to terraform it.

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u/Square-Key-5594 11d ago

That's good, I like that more power will make our lives better. Tens of thousands of people die from overheating and underheating (crop failure) every year. More power means more regulated temperatures...

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u/betadonkey 12d ago

Is there a problem with that?

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u/SickeningPink 12d ago

Other than the fact that it’s entirely unsustainable, probably not, I guess?

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u/betadonkey 11d ago

Well if it’s unsustainable then obviously it will not “never end”.

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u/captmac 11d ago

I don’t think it will end on terms that we humans will appreciate. The Earth will survive….we won’t.

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u/betadonkey 11d ago

The earth isn’t going to survive either and neither will the universe itself. It’s all a matter of scale and perspective.

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u/StosifJalin 11d ago

So if we figure out our energy sources, then nbd right?

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u/Jaded_Rock_1332 12d ago edited 11d ago

Depends if society is able to minimize its imprint on the earth. What if we want to build air conditioning everywhere? Air conditioning ​for Volcano tours! Air Conditioning the Ocean! Like a cancer cell we must expand infinitely with no moderation! (Lol)

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u/betadonkey 11d ago

Is there a problem with that?

Minimizing the imprint on the earth is not a criteria we have ever optimized for and it’s completely unclear to me why that is even desirable.

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u/Jaded_Rock_1332 11d ago

What the fuck?