Sources

The Dalles' mayor called OPB's data center story inaccurate. Here are the facts — OPB, 23 Jan 2026News

Google's annual water use in The Dalles: 104M gallons in 2012, 383.9M in 2023, 434.4M in 2024 — 1.19 million gallons a day. "Google uses a third of the overall water consumed by the city." The city's 2024 Water System Master Plan forecasts residential rates climbing 99% by 2036. This is the source for the number the pump counts to.

More Oregon water for Google's data centers, more concern over secrecy — The Oregonian / OregonLive, Apr 2026News

The reporting that made the figures public at all. Google's usage in The Dalles was held under a non-disclosure agreement until an Oregon newspaper sued to open it.

xAI supercomputer — Protect Our AquiferAdvocacy

1.3 million gallons a day of municipal drinking water "at least until either MLGW or xAI builds a water reuse plant"; peak demand expected near 5 million gallons a day, later cited at 5.7M for the expansion.

xAI sidelines major water reuse project as IPO looms — E&E NewsNews

The reuse plant that the drinking-water draw was supposed to be temporary until.

Data Drain: The Land and Water Impacts of the AI Boom — Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, Feb 2026Report

Two-thirds of data centers built since 2022 sit in water-stressed regions (per a Bloomberg analysis). Also the land-use and transparency angles.

The Data Center Water Problem Is Soluble — ITIF, 6 Jul 2026Report

The counterweight, and worth reading as one: withdrawal is not consumption, potable is not recycled, and the industry's own reporting counts only on-site water while the indirect draw at the power plant is several times larger. Nationally the total is a small share of US water use; the problem is local.

How much electricity does an American home use? — US Energy Information AdministrationGov

"In 2022, the average annual amount of electricity sold to a U.S. residential electric-utility customer was 10,791 kilowatthours" — 1.2318 kW averaged over the year. The divisor behind both the 81,000 and the Colossus figure beside it.

Colossus 2 — Epoch AI, data center directoryData

xAI's Colossus 2 at 946 MW of IT power as of 15 Jun 2026, projected to 1,531 MW by Q1 2027. Tracked from 239 MW in Jan 2026 and 490 MW in Apr 2026.

Data Centers: Background and Issues for Congress — Congressional Research Service, R48646Gov

Facility size ranges. Most data centers fall in the 10–100 MW band; 100 MW is the top of ordinary, not the middle of it.

New Jersey electric bills to rise up to 20% — Utility Dive, 2025News

Rates up 17.2–20.2% from 1 Jun 2025 across PSE&G, JCP&L, Atlantic City Electric and Rockland. Driven by the PJM capacity auction; PJM's own spokesperson cites "demand … increasing dramatically due to data center proliferation."

How data centers are raising our bills in Illinois — Citizens Utility BoardAdvocacy

The same mechanism in a second state. A follow-up from Jul 2026 puts ComEd's rise at about 50% since June 2025.

Data centers drive 76% surge in PJM power prices — E&E NewsNews

$136.53/MWh in Q1 2026 against $77.78 in the same quarter of 2025. PJM covers thirteen states, so this is not a local effect.

OpenAI is building Stargate — Data Center DynamicsIndustry

The 10 GW target, and the 1.2 GW first phase — about a million homes on the same arithmetic.

xAI built an illegal power plant to power its data center — Southern Environmental Law CenterReport

27 gas turbines run without an air permit, with the potential to emit up to 180 tons of fine particulate, 500 tons of carbon monoxide, 19 tons of formaldehyde and more than 1,700 tons of nitrogen oxides a year. SELC and Earthjustice represent the NAACP in the resulting suit. Extrapolated down to eight turbines that is 53.3 tons — within 6% of entry 16's figure for eight, from a different site and a different analyst.

Pollution from Musk's unpermitted xAI power project hits hardest in Black communities — Reuters, 14 Jul 2026News

59 turbines, 57 of them just over the state line in Southaven, Mississippi. From manufacturer emissions profiles for 32 of them, Reuters calculated that 30 turbines alone could emit nearly 2,500 short tons of nitrogen oxide, 4,000 of carbon monoxide and 22 of formaldehyde a year at 80% of capacity.

New study finds on-site power at Virginia data center could result in $53–99 million in annual health damages — Piedmont Environmental Council / EmPower Analytics GroupResearch

A Loudoun County facility permitted for eight natural gas turbines and 51 diesel generators — the same pairing this page draws — at $53–99 million a year in health damages and 3.4–6.5 additional premature deaths. Led by Dr Michael Cork, a Harvard-affiliated health scientist. The eight turbines' 56.51 short tons of PM2.5 a year is the numerator of the car figure. See also the Harvard T.H. Chan write-up.

Data Centers are Hotbeds of Health Risks — Environmental and Energy Study InstituteReport

Industrial diesel generators release "200 to 600 times more toxic nitrous oxides than a natural gas plant" per unit of electricity, per the South Coast Air Quality Management District — the answer to the multiple choice on this page. If northern Virginia's data centers ran their generators to the full extent their permits allow, the estimated annual public health cost is $2.2–3.0 billion.

The Unpaid Toll: Quantifying the Public Health Impact of AI — Caltech / UC Riverside, arXiv:2412.06288Research

The modelling behind the Virginia figures. From the permitted site-level limits for northern Virginia's backup generators, and assuming actual emissions at 10% of permitted: "backup generators could contribute to approximately 14,000 asthma symptom cases and 13–19 premature deaths each year … an estimated annual public health burden of $220–300 million across the U.S." At the full permitted level, in a prolonged grid outage, $2.2–3.0 billion. Puts the national total for all data centers at more than $20 billion by 2028.

Brake and Tire Wear Emissions from On-road Vehicles in MOVES — US EPAGov

The per-car side of the comparison, and the one judgement call in it. Brake and tire wear alone comes to about 50 g of PM2.5 a year — the basis used here, and what CARB's documentation covers. Adding tailpipe PM2.5 brings the three together to roughly 0.010 g/mile, near 120 g over a 12,000-mile year, which would make the answer about 425,000 cars instead of a million. Neither is wrong; they answer slightly different questions, and the constant is one line in js/air.js. See also AP-42 for the stationary-source side.

Environmental groups contest Texas data centers' air pollution — Inside Climate News, 22 Jul 2026News

Not Memphis. A 60-day notice of intent to sue Vantage and VoltaGrid over San Antonio facilities, alleging unpermitted generators and gas plants — the same pattern in a second state.

Data Centers in Virginia — Virginia JLARC, Report 598Gov

"Data center noise that has prompted resident complaints ranges from an estimated 40 to 59 decibels … This sound level is typically below the 55 or 60 decibel limit that Loudoun, Prince William, and Fairfax allow in their ordinances for residential areas. Rather than the volume of the noise, it's data centers' constant noise that some residents consider problematic." Described as a "drone" or "hum", audible indoors as well as out. At least 15 sites — 10% of Virginia's operational data centers — have generated complaints.

Amazon tones down its data center noise after residents sound the alarm — Prince William TimesNews

What it takes to get a fix, and how long: complaints in 2021, mitigation completed after repeated communication.

Michigan residents sue over AI data center noise — they're not alone — Newsweek, Aug 2026News

The building you can hear on the sound page. Dowagiac, Michigan: a crypto mine converted to AI in 2024, its industrial cooling fans running continuously since, now the subject of a suit by neighbouring residents. The same piece covers a proposed class action over Microsoft's Fairwater sites in Wisconsin and complaints in Sterling, Virginia. See also HotHardware on the 2021→2024 conversion.

Communities are raising noise pollution concerns about data centers — Environmental and Energy Study InstituteReport

Why low-frequency noise evades decibel-meter enforcement. A-weighting is built around human speech sensitivity and discounts the 60–120 Hz band a data center is loudest in, so the measurement everyone accepts is the one least able to detect the complaint.

Data center noise and community impact — Frontiers in Climate, 2026Research

Peer-reviewed treatment of the same ground.

Data centers are creating 'heat islands', warming the land around them by up to 16 degrees — CNN, 30 Mar 2026Research coverage

Cambridge-led preprint across 6,000+ facilities: average +3.6°F surface warming after opening, up to +16.4°F. Behind the heat slide in the ecosystem view.

From energy use to air quality, the many ways data centers affect US communities — World Resources InstituteReport

Broad overview; includes the Memphis turbine case and the NAACP Clean Air Act notice.

AI Data Center Health Impacts — Environmental Health Sciences, updated Aug 2026Report

A maintained compendium spanning air, noise and infrasound, EMF, PFAS, thermal discharge, herbicide spraying along transmission corridors, and e-waste. Cited directly on the land-degradation slide.

US data center electricity use could more than double by 2030 — Utility Dive on the Kansas Health Institute report, Jul 2026Report

183 TWh in 2024, over 4% of US electricity, projected to 426 TWh by 2030; water use roughly 4× by 2028.

Community backlash to AI data centers is growing across the U.S. — TIME, 22 Jul 2026News

New York's state moratorium, 142 protests across 42 states, 300+ local bans or moratoriums, and 75 projects worth $130B delayed in Q1 2026.

Data center light pollution: DarkSky's statement on responsible development — DarkSky International, Jun 2026Report

There is no light view any more, but the ecosystem carousel's light slide draws on this: opposition to siting in International Dark Sky Places, and the Five Principles of Responsible Outdoor Lighting.