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Whitmer is pushing this massive AI data center in Saline Township, calling it “The Barn” because they’re designing the buildings to look like big red barns instead of typical industrial boxes. It’s for Oracle and OpenAI, a 16 billion dollar project on about 250 acres of what was farmland.... She was all smiles at the groundbreaking Monday, saying it’s the largest investment in Michigan history, will bring tens of billions to the state, create thousands of union jobs, and that they’re protecting water and land with a closed-loop cooling system. Locals fought it hard, township initially rejected rezoning, got sued, settled under pressure, and some officials faced threats and recalls. The same poll shows most people don’t want these nearby without ironclad guarantees on electric rates and water use. On the money part, the state gave big tax breaks on equipment for these projects, so the companies save a ton, while the promised local tax revenue is debated. A lot of people are asking the same questions who’s really cashing in long-term. This Saline “Barn” project, the massive one for Oracle and OpenAI, is a gigawatt-scale hyperscale data center. Officials claim it’ll create over 2,500 union construction jobs during building, then about 450 permanent on-site jobs plus 1,500 more county-wide in support roles. The long-term reality: once it’s running, these automated facilities need very few people. Experts point out data center job promises are often overblown, past Michigan projects like Switch promised hundreds or thousands and delivered far fewer, like just 26 in one case. The real money and power use goes to the tech giants, while locals get the infrastructure strain and modest tax revenue at best.show more

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A small town in Michigan voted against a massive Data Center but the developers are moving ahead with the project anyway Your vote literally doesn’t even matter, they’re just going to do whatever they want It’s a huge $16 billion project for OpenAI and Oracle. Last September, Saline Township board members voted 4 to 1 against allowing a proposal for an AI data center to proceed The land has been zoned agricultural for decades, even hundreds of years. They didn't want it to become anything industrial Now 575 acres of farmland are being rezoned for the data center. The full campus footprint described as up to 21 million square feet. It’s one of the largest construction projects in Michigan history Here’s what happened - Related Digital (the developer) proposed rezoning agricultural land - September 2025: Saline Township Planning Commission and Board voted against it - Just 2 days later: Related Digital sued for “exclusionary zoning” - Township settled quickly because they were advised they couldn’t afford the ongoing lawsuit against these tech giants The plant will use the equivalent energy of 1 million homes Apparently energy usage and climate change aren’t a problem anymore. Funny how that works…. Just a couple years ago we were told not to use our air conditionings because we’d destroy the planet

A small town in Michigan voted against a massive Data Center but the developers are moving ahead with the project anyway Your vote literally doesn’t even matter, they’re just going to do whatever they want It’s a huge $16 billion project for OpenAI and Oracle. Last September, Saline Township board members voted 4 to 1 against allowing a proposal for an AI data center to proceed The land has been zoned agricultural for decades, even hundreds of years. They didn't want it to become anything industrial Now 575 acres of farmland are being rezoned for the data center. The full campus footprint described as up to 21 million square feet. It’s one of the largest construction projects in Michigan history Here’s what happened - Related Digital (the developer) proposed rezoning agricultural land - September 2025: Saline Township Planning Commission and Board voted against it - Just 2 days later: Related Digital sued for “exclusionary zoning” - Township settled quickly because they were advised they couldn’t afford the ongoing lawsuit against these tech giants The plant will use the equivalent energy of 1 million homes Apparently energy usage and climate change aren’t a problem anymore. Funny how that works…. Just a couple years ago we were told not to use our air conditionings because we’d destroy the planet

Wall Street Apes

198,035 views • 3 months ago

There are RVs parked for miles in Abilene, Texas They are used for temporary housing for thousands of construction workers building massive AI data centers Abilene is in the middle of a huge AI data center boom, projects include OpenAI, Oracle, Crusoe, Microsoft, and more. These are multibillion dollar campuses, some valued at more than $26 billion+ The power needs for these data centers in this area will exceed 1 million average homes They’ll use about 8 million gallons of water

There are RVs parked for miles in Abilene, Texas They are used for temporary housing for thousands of construction workers building massive AI data centers Abilene is in the middle of a huge AI data center boom, projects include OpenAI, Oracle, Crusoe, Microsoft, and more. These are multibillion dollar campuses, some valued at more than $26 billion+ The power needs for these data centers in this area will exceed 1 million average homes They’ll use about 8 million gallons of water

Wall Street Apes

334,605 views • 3 months ago

$People in Utah have started asking us an important question, when you build these power facilities for AI data centers, can some of that energy be sold back into the local grid? The answer is yes. That completely changes the conversation. Instead of being seen as “the evil data center guys,” we can help power Utah’s grid while also building critical AI infrastructure for the future. And despite the headlines, we’re not building the world’s largest data center overnight. We’re starting with just 1.5 gigawatts with 1 gigawatt of net IT load a small fraction of the long-term proposal and proving the model first. And it’s not a 40,000 acre data center. Our project a full build out will span 10-13k acres 7,500 of which will be preserved. We want the people of Box Elder County to come see it themselves, the EPA air quality standards, the water permits, the noise compliance, and how the project actually operates before anything scales further.$

People in Utah have started asking us an important question, when you build these power facilities for AI data centers, can some of that energy be sold back into the local grid? The answer is yes. That completely changes the conversation. Instead of being seen as “the evil data center guys,” we can help power Utah’s grid while also building critical AI infrastructure for the future. And despite the headlines, we’re not building the world’s largest data center overnight. We’re starting with just 1.5 gigawatts with 1 gigawatt of net IT load a small fraction of the long-term proposal and proving the model first. And it’s not a 40,000 acre data center. Our project a full build out will span 10-13k acres 7,500 of which will be preserved. We want the people of Box Elder County to come see it themselves, the EPA air quality standards, the water permits, the noise compliance, and how the project actually operates before anything scales further.

Kevin O'Leary aka Mr. Wonderful

71,642 views • 3 months ago

The RVs parked for miles in Abilene, Texas seem to never end I shared earlier footage of this, but this shows they are expanding and building 2,300 more spaces They are used for temporary housing for thousands of construction workers building massive AI data centers The city has approved large-scale RV parks specifically for data center workers, including a nearly 1,000-space park on Elmdale Road and plans for up to 2,300+ spaces total across new developments Abilene is in the middle of a huge AI data center boom, projects include OpenAI, Oracle, Crusoe, Microsoft, and more. These are multibillion dollar campuses, some valued at more than $26 billion+ The power needs for these data centers in this area will exceed 1 million average homes They’ll use about 8 million gallons of water Each major project can have as many as 6,000 workers on site each day

The RVs parked for miles in Abilene, Texas seem to never end I shared earlier footage of this, but this shows they are expanding and building 2,300 more spaces They are used for temporary housing for thousands of construction workers building massive AI data centers The city has approved large-scale RV parks specifically for data center workers, including a nearly 1,000-space park on Elmdale Road and plans for up to 2,300+ spaces total across new developments Abilene is in the middle of a huge AI data center boom, projects include OpenAI, Oracle, Crusoe, Microsoft, and more. These are multibillion dollar campuses, some valued at more than $26 billion+ The power needs for these data centers in this area will exceed 1 million average homes They’ll use about 8 million gallons of water Each major project can have as many as 6,000 workers on site each day

Wall Street Apes

60,962 views • 3 months ago

American who works building Data Centers says the amount of money he sees being poured into these projects, “It’s like money isn’t real” “Seeing the amount of money and labor and investment into this, and then you talk to some of your contractor friends and the budgets just aren't real. It's almost like the amount of money they're spending on AI farms, it's like money's not even real” The average large hyperscale data center project cost is about $2 billion - $5 billion+ Here’s where it gets really crazy Nationwide total over the last 5 years on data centers is roughly $100–150 billion in just construction alone, and around $1 trillion when including all equipment and related capital spending

American who works building Data Centers says the amount of money he sees being poured into these projects, “It’s like money isn’t real” “Seeing the amount of money and labor and investment into this, and then you talk to some of your contractor friends and the budgets just aren't real. It's almost like the amount of money they're spending on AI farms, it's like money's not even real” The average large hyperscale data center project cost is about $2 billion - $5 billion+ Here’s where it gets really crazy Nationwide total over the last 5 years on data centers is roughly $100–150 billion in just construction alone, and around $1 trillion when including all equipment and related capital spending

Wall Street Apes

282,361 views • 1 month ago

As AI systems rapidly expand, communities across America are seeing massive data centers suddenly appear near their neighborhoods. These facilities consume enormous amounts of electricity, water, land, and infrastructure resources, driving up utility costs, straining local housing markets, and changing the quality of life for families who have lived in these communities for generations. Big Tech companies promote these projects as innovation, while government officials increasingly frame them as national security infrastructure. When residents in Utah protested one proposed data center in their community, Kevin O’Leary dismissed them as “foreign agents,” further fueling frustration among locals who say their concerns are being ignored. Despite widespread opposition, local, state, and federal authorities continue pushing these projects forward. Many residents worry about long-term impacts on jobs, family stability, property values, farmland, water access, wildlife, and the broader ecosystem surrounding these rapidly expanding industrial sites. At the same time, questions are growing about whether this infrastructure is laying the foundation for a future built around digital ID systems, AI surveillance, and centralized technological control, while everyday citizens are left paying the economic and environmental costs. HealthRanger joins me to break it all down.

As AI systems rapidly expand, communities across America are seeing massive data centers suddenly appear near their neighborhoods. These facilities consume enormous amounts of electricity, water, land, and infrastructure resources, driving up utility costs, straining local housing markets, and changing the quality of life for families who have lived in these communities for generations. Big Tech companies promote these projects as innovation, while government officials increasingly frame them as national security infrastructure. When residents in Utah protested one proposed data center in their community, Kevin O’Leary dismissed them as “foreign agents,” further fueling frustration among locals who say their concerns are being ignored. Despite widespread opposition, local, state, and federal authorities continue pushing these projects forward. Many residents worry about long-term impacts on jobs, family stability, property values, farmland, water access, wildlife, and the broader ecosystem surrounding these rapidly expanding industrial sites. At the same time, questions are growing about whether this infrastructure is laying the foundation for a future built around digital ID systems, AI surveillance, and centralized technological control, while everyday citizens are left paying the economic and environmental costs. HealthRanger joins me to break it all down.

Ben Swann

56,802 views • 3 months ago

🚨 EUROPE IS BURNING… RIGHT AFTER POLITICIANS SIGNED MASSIVE DATA CENTER DEALS — AND PEOPLE ARE CONNECTING THE DOTS The same year politicians across Europe signed major contracts for new data centers… the continent is being hit by some of the worst wildfires in its history. Entire towns are being destroyed. Communities that protested the data center boom are watching their land burn. Some of those same people may now be forced to sell their land to the very companies they didn’t want there in the first place. At the same time, a strange and extreme heat wave is forcing millions of people to buy air conditioners all at once. And now politicians are saying they have no choice but to build more power plants… because of the heat wave. All of this is happening in countries that have already been dealing with severe drought for years. Data centers need massive amounts of power and land. Europe is suddenly on fire and overheating. Are these just tragic coincidences… or is something else going on?

🚨 EUROPE IS BURNING… RIGHT AFTER POLITICIANS SIGNED MASSIVE DATA CENTER DEALS — AND PEOPLE ARE CONNECTING THE DOTS The same year politicians across Europe signed major contracts for new data centers… the continent is being hit by some of the worst wildfires in its history. Entire towns are being destroyed. Communities that protested the data center boom are watching their land burn. Some of those same people may now be forced to sell their land to the very companies they didn’t want there in the first place. At the same time, a strange and extreme heat wave is forcing millions of people to buy air conditioners all at once. And now politicians are saying they have no choice but to build more power plants… because of the heat wave. All of this is happening in countries that have already been dealing with severe drought for years. Data centers need massive amounts of power and land. Europe is suddenly on fire and overheating. Are these just tragic coincidences… or is something else going on?

HustleBitch

71,710 views • 21 days ago

Another billion dollar data center proposal, this time in the small town of Osawatomie, Kansas This 600,000 sq ft data center would be in a town of only 4,200 people It’ll use 150,000 homes worth of power and 1 million gallons of water per day The 116 acres is full of birds, frogs, insects and open land that will be wiped out Residents are very worried about strain on the local river, summer water shortages and downstream impacts Don’t we have enough data centers already There needs to be some end to this, there has to be a limit

Another billion dollar data center proposal, this time in the small town of Osawatomie, Kansas This 600,000 sq ft data center would be in a town of only 4,200 people It’ll use 150,000 homes worth of power and 1 million gallons of water per day The 116 acres is full of birds, frogs, insects and open land that will be wiped out Residents are very worried about strain on the local river, summer water shortages and downstream impacts Don’t we have enough data centers already There needs to be some end to this, there has to be a limit

Wall Street Apes

62,466 views • 3 months ago

Billion-Dollar Data Centers Are Taking Over the World | Lauren Goode, WIRED When Sam Altman said one year ago that OpenAI’s Roman Empire is the actual Roman Empire, he wasn’t kidding. In the same way that the Romans gradually amassed an empire of land spanning three continents and one-ninth of the Earth’s circumference, the CEO and his cohort are now dotting the planet with their own latifundia—not agricultural estates, but AI data centers. Tech executives like Altman, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, and Oracle cofounder Larry Ellison are fully bought in to the idea that the future of the American (and possibly global) economy are these new warehouses stocked with IT infrastructure. But data centers, of course, aren’t actually new. In the earliest days of computing there were giant power-sucking mainframes in climate-controlled rooms, with co-ax cables moving information from the mainframe to a terminal computer. Then the consumer internet boom of the late 1990s spawned a new era of infrastructure. Massive buildings began popping up in the backyard of Washington, DC, with racks and racks of computers that stored and processed data for tech companies. A decade later, “the cloud” became the squishy infrastructure of the internet. Storage got cheaper. Some companies, like Amazon, capitalized on this. Giant data centers continued to proliferate, but instead of a tech company using some combination of on-premise servers and rented data center racks, they offloaded their computing needs to a bunch of virtualized environments. (“What is the cloud?” a perfectly intelligent family member asked me in the mid-2010s, “and why am I paying for 17 different subscriptions to it?”) All the while tech companies were hoovering up petabytes of data, data that people willingly shared online, in enterprise workspaces, and through mobile apps. Firms began finding new ways to mine and structure this “Big Data,” and promised that it would change lives. In many ways, it did. You had to know where this was going. Now the tech industry is in the fever-dream days of generative AI, which requires new levels of computing resources. Big Data is tired; big data centers are here, and wired—for AI. Faster, more efficient chips are needed to power AI data centers, and chipmakers like Nvidia and AMD have been jumping up and down on the proverbial couch, proclaiming their love for AI. The industry has entered an unprecedented era of capital investments in AI infrastructure, tilting the US into positive GDP territory. These are massive, swirling deals that might as well be cocktail party handshakes, greased with gigawatts and exuberance, while the rest of us try to track real contracts and dollars. OpenAI, Microsoft, Nvidia, Oracle, and SoftBank have struck some of the biggest deals. This year an earlier supercomputing project between OpenAI and Microsoft, called Stargate, became the vehicle for a massive AI infrastructure project in the US. (President Donald Trump called it the largest AI infrastructure project in history, because of course he did, but that may not have been hyperbolic.) Altman, Ellison, and SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son were all in on the deal, pledging $100 billion to start, with plans to invest up to $500 billion into Stargate in the coming years. Nvidia GPUs would be deployed. Later, in July, OpenAI and Oracle announced an additional Stargate partnership—SoftBank curiously absent—measured in gigawatts of capacity (4.5) and expected job creation (around 100,000). Microsoft, Amazon, and Meta have also shared plans for multibillion-dollar data projects. Microsoft said at the start of 2025 that it was on track to invest “approximately $80 billion to build out AI-enabled data centers to train AI models and deploy AI and cloud-based applications around the world.” Then, in September, Nvidia said it would invest up to $100 billion in OpenAI, provided that OpenAI made good on a deal to use up to 10 gigawatts of Nvidia’s systems for OpenAI’s infrastructure plans, which means essentially that OpenAI has to pay Nvidia in order to get paid by Nvidia. The following month AMD said it would give OpenAI as much as 10 percent of the chip company if OpenAI purchased and deployed up to 6 gigawatts of AMD GPUs between now and 2030. It’s the circular nature of these investments that have the general public, and bearish analysts, wondering if we’re headed for an AI bubble burst. What’s clear is that the near-term downstream effects of these data center build-outs are real. The energy, resource, and labor demands of AI infrastructure are enormous. By some estimates, worldwide AI energy demand is set to surpass demand from bitcoin mining by the end of this year, WIRED has reported. The processors in data centers run hot and need to be cooled, so big tech companies are pulling from municipal water supplies to make that happen—and aren’t always disclosing how much water they’re using. Local wells are running dry or seem unsafe to drink from. Residents who live near data center construction sites are noting that traffic delays, and in some cases car crashes, are increasing. One corner of Richland Parish, Louisiana, home of Meta’s $27 billion Hyperion data center, has seen a 600 percent spike in vehicle crashes this year. Major proponents of AI seem to suggest that all of this will be worth it. Few top tech executives will publicly entertain the notion that this might be an overshoot, either ecologically or economically. “Emphatically … no,” Lisa Su, the chief executive of AMD, said earlier this month when asked if the AI froth has runneth over. Su, like other execs, cited overwhelming demand for AI as justification for these enormous capital expenditures. Demand from whom? Harder to pin down. In their mind, it’s everyone. All of us. The 800 million people who use ChatGPT on a weekly basis. The evolution from those 1990s data centers to the 2000s era of cloud computing to new AI data centers wasn’t just one continuum. The world has concurrently moved from the tiny internet to the big internet to the AI internet, and realistically speaking, there’s no going back. Generative AI is out of the bottle. The Sams and Jensens and Larrys and Lisas of the world aren’t wrong about this. It doesn’t mean they aren’t wrong about the math, though. About their economic predictions. Or their ideas about AI-powered productivity and the labor market. Or the availability of natural and material resources for these data centers. Or who will come once they build them. Or the timing of it all. Even Rome eventually collapsed.

Billion-Dollar Data Centers Are Taking Over the World | Lauren Goode, WIRED When Sam Altman said one year ago that OpenAI’s Roman Empire is the actual Roman Empire, he wasn’t kidding. In the same way that the Romans gradually amassed an empire of land spanning three continents and one-ninth of the Earth’s circumference, the CEO and his cohort are now dotting the planet with their own latifundia—not agricultural estates, but AI data centers. Tech executives like Altman, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, and Oracle cofounder Larry Ellison are fully bought in to the idea that the future of the American (and possibly global) economy are these new warehouses stocked with IT infrastructure. But data centers, of course, aren’t actually new. In the earliest days of computing there were giant power-sucking mainframes in climate-controlled rooms, with co-ax cables moving information from the mainframe to a terminal computer. Then the consumer internet boom of the late 1990s spawned a new era of infrastructure. Massive buildings began popping up in the backyard of Washington, DC, with racks and racks of computers that stored and processed data for tech companies. A decade later, “the cloud” became the squishy infrastructure of the internet. Storage got cheaper. Some companies, like Amazon, capitalized on this. Giant data centers continued to proliferate, but instead of a tech company using some combination of on-premise servers and rented data center racks, they offloaded their computing needs to a bunch of virtualized environments. (“What is the cloud?” a perfectly intelligent family member asked me in the mid-2010s, “and why am I paying for 17 different subscriptions to it?”) All the while tech companies were hoovering up petabytes of data, data that people willingly shared online, in enterprise workspaces, and through mobile apps. Firms began finding new ways to mine and structure this “Big Data,” and promised that it would change lives. In many ways, it did. You had to know where this was going. Now the tech industry is in the fever-dream days of generative AI, which requires new levels of computing resources. Big Data is tired; big data centers are here, and wired—for AI. Faster, more efficient chips are needed to power AI data centers, and chipmakers like Nvidia and AMD have been jumping up and down on the proverbial couch, proclaiming their love for AI. The industry has entered an unprecedented era of capital investments in AI infrastructure, tilting the US into positive GDP territory. These are massive, swirling deals that might as well be cocktail party handshakes, greased with gigawatts and exuberance, while the rest of us try to track real contracts and dollars. OpenAI, Microsoft, Nvidia, Oracle, and SoftBank have struck some of the biggest deals. This year an earlier supercomputing project between OpenAI and Microsoft, called Stargate, became the vehicle for a massive AI infrastructure project in the US. (President Donald Trump called it the largest AI infrastructure project in history, because of course he did, but that may not have been hyperbolic.) Altman, Ellison, and SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son were all in on the deal, pledging $100 billion to start, with plans to invest up to $500 billion into Stargate in the coming years. Nvidia GPUs would be deployed. Later, in July, OpenAI and Oracle announced an additional Stargate partnership—SoftBank curiously absent—measured in gigawatts of capacity (4.5) and expected job creation (around 100,000). Microsoft, Amazon, and Meta have also shared plans for multibillion-dollar data projects. Microsoft said at the start of 2025 that it was on track to invest “approximately $80 billion to build out AI-enabled data centers to train AI models and deploy AI and cloud-based applications around the world.” Then, in September, Nvidia said it would invest up to $100 billion in OpenAI, provided that OpenAI made good on a deal to use up to 10 gigawatts of Nvidia’s systems for OpenAI’s infrastructure plans, which means essentially that OpenAI has to pay Nvidia in order to get paid by Nvidia. The following month AMD said it would give OpenAI as much as 10 percent of the chip company if OpenAI purchased and deployed up to 6 gigawatts of AMD GPUs between now and 2030. It’s the circular nature of these investments that have the general public, and bearish analysts, wondering if we’re headed for an AI bubble burst. What’s clear is that the near-term downstream effects of these data center build-outs are real. The energy, resource, and labor demands of AI infrastructure are enormous. By some estimates, worldwide AI energy demand is set to surpass demand from bitcoin mining by the end of this year, WIRED has reported. The processors in data centers run hot and need to be cooled, so big tech companies are pulling from municipal water supplies to make that happen—and aren’t always disclosing how much water they’re using. Local wells are running dry or seem unsafe to drink from. Residents who live near data center construction sites are noting that traffic delays, and in some cases car crashes, are increasing. One corner of Richland Parish, Louisiana, home of Meta’s $27 billion Hyperion data center, has seen a 600 percent spike in vehicle crashes this year. Major proponents of AI seem to suggest that all of this will be worth it. Few top tech executives will publicly entertain the notion that this might be an overshoot, either ecologically or economically. “Emphatically … no,” Lisa Su, the chief executive of AMD, said earlier this month when asked if the AI froth has runneth over. Su, like other execs, cited overwhelming demand for AI as justification for these enormous capital expenditures. Demand from whom? Harder to pin down. In their mind, it’s everyone. All of us. The 800 million people who use ChatGPT on a weekly basis. The evolution from those 1990s data centers to the 2000s era of cloud computing to new AI data centers wasn’t just one continuum. The world has concurrently moved from the tiny internet to the big internet to the AI internet, and realistically speaking, there’s no going back. Generative AI is out of the bottle. The Sams and Jensens and Larrys and Lisas of the world aren’t wrong about this. It doesn’t mean they aren’t wrong about the math, though. About their economic predictions. Or their ideas about AI-powered productivity and the labor market. Or the availability of natural and material resources for these data centers. Or who will come once they build them. Or the timing of it all. Even Rome eventually collapsed.

Owen Gregorian

55,427 views • 7 months ago

Jolly: Byron Donalds’ real plan to bring down property taxes is to devalue your house by building a hyperscale data center next door to you. Byron Donalds is doing something that Donald Trump is doing and every other conflicted politician is doing who’s on all sides of this issue now. So big tech wants to come in and bring in the hyperscale data centers. Politicians like Byron Donalds have said, “Yeah, come on in. Build on our pristine lands. Give me the money in my campaign account, and I’ll let you do it.” Voters said, “Whoa, whoa, whoa. We don’t want hyperscale data centers.” And so now the position of the White House and Byron Donalds has pivoted to the following: “Ratepayer protection.” Ratepayer protection is what they’re saying to make it look like they’re pushing back. Now, understand what that means. That means that big tech and utilities have to pay their own way. They’re allowed to plunder as long as they pay for the plundering. Well, voters are saying, “We don’t want you to plunder.” And by the way, paying your own way should have been the baseline. That’s not a big reform. That’s just because they got caught subsidizing the development of these hyperscale data centers. Now, their position is, “We’re going to make them pay their own way,” and they’re taking a victory lap as though it’s some important consumer protection. No, it’s not. Look who’s cheering on the Trump-Donalds plan for hyperscale data centers. Who is cheering it on? Big tech and big utilities. Who’s against it? Voters. And so, it is a bold-faced lie when you hear Byron Donalds say, “I’m protecting the people of Florida.” No, he’s not. He’s allowing big tech and hyperscale data centers to come into your backyard, plunder our environment, devalue your property, destabilize your community, and then pat himself on the back all the way on his road to what he thinks is going to be a November victory. He’ll be proven wrong.

Jolly: Byron Donalds’ real plan to bring down property taxes is to devalue your house by building a hyperscale data center next door to you. Byron Donalds is doing something that Donald Trump is doing and every other conflicted politician is doing who’s on all sides of this issue now. So big tech wants to come in and bring in the hyperscale data centers. Politicians like Byron Donalds have said, “Yeah, come on in. Build on our pristine lands. Give me the money in my campaign account, and I’ll let you do it.” Voters said, “Whoa, whoa, whoa. We don’t want hyperscale data centers.” And so now the position of the White House and Byron Donalds has pivoted to the following: “Ratepayer protection.” Ratepayer protection is what they’re saying to make it look like they’re pushing back. Now, understand what that means. That means that big tech and utilities have to pay their own way. They’re allowed to plunder as long as they pay for the plundering. Well, voters are saying, “We don’t want you to plunder.” And by the way, paying your own way should have been the baseline. That’s not a big reform. That’s just because they got caught subsidizing the development of these hyperscale data centers. Now, their position is, “We’re going to make them pay their own way,” and they’re taking a victory lap as though it’s some important consumer protection. No, it’s not. Look who’s cheering on the Trump-Donalds plan for hyperscale data centers. Who is cheering it on? Big tech and big utilities. Who’s against it? Voters. And so, it is a bold-faced lie when you hear Byron Donalds say, “I’m protecting the people of Florida.” No, he’s not. He’s allowing big tech and hyperscale data centers to come into your backyard, plunder our environment, devalue your property, destabilize your community, and then pat himself on the back all the way on his road to what he thinks is going to be a November victory. He’ll be proven wrong.

Acyn

64,845 views • 15 days ago

Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, recently said at BlackRock’s US Infrastructure Summit in Washington, DC that the plan is to have artificial intelligence “metered” like water and power So here’s what’s happening “Let me connect these dots for you because this is not a conspiracy. This is literally happening right now — Local governments are footing the bill for brand new power lines, road upgrades and fire stations. Meanwhile, data centers are the literal physical buildings running this AI and they're getting billions in tax breaks. One estimate just ballooned from $327 million to $2.5 billion in breaks. That's your tax money subsidizing the infrastructure that they're gonna turn around and charge you to use” Once this infrastructure is built out, they plan on charging Americans on a “meter system” just like they do water, power and electricity Local governments and industries will use it, and we’ll all be paying monthly for it We are paying for them to build it, so they can turn working and charge us for it

Wall Street Apes

293,838 views • 4 months ago

Every Wall Street giant that owns an AI data center is suddenly looking for a buyer. And NONE of them want to be the last one holding it. Three of them made their move in the last two weeks: Vantage Data Centers is exploring an exit. Its owners, Silver Lake and DigitalBridge, are weighing a listing at around $100 billion, or a sale, or a stake sale. It would be the largest data center IPO ever done. Three days earlier, CyrusOne started the same process. KKR and Global Infrastructure Partners met Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, and the banks pitched for roles on a listing that could come as early as 2027. Last month, Switch hired Goldman and JPMorgan to take it public at close to $80 billion including debt, possibly by the fourth quarter. Three different companies moved inside the same 14 days, and the same handful of investment banks took every call. And these are the exact same firms that BOUGHT these companies off the public market four years ago. Between June 2021 and early 2022, private equity took the data center industry private. Blackstone bought QTS. KKR and Global Infrastructure Partners took CyrusOne private in a deal worth about $15 billion. DigitalBridge and IFM took Switch private for about $11 billion. Together those deals ran past $35 billion. By 2023 there were only two pure-play data center companies left on the public market. The logic at the time was that data centers burn cash for years before they pay, and public shareholders hate that. But private money was patient, and private money could wait. Four years later, the AI boom arrived and every one of those buildings became a gold mine. So follow this: Switch went private at about $11 billion in 2022. Its owners now want close to $80 billion for it. That is roughly 7x, in four years, on the same buildings. And DigitalBridge sits on both sides of this. It owns a piece of Vantage and it took Switch private. It is now looking for the door on BOTH. The question now is who is supposed to buy. There is no bigger private buyer left to sell to. These are already the largest infrastructure funds on Earth, and the price tags now run to $100 billion. The only pocket deep enough is the public market, which means anyone with a brokerage account or an index fund. The people who bought low from the public are now organizing to sell high back to the public. And they are doing it while telling everyone the buildout is just getting started. KKR raised a record $19.2 billion for its newest infrastructure fund this month, and in June launched a separate company with over $10 billion committed to finance more construction. So one hand raises fresh billions to build more data centers, and the other hand sells the finished ones to whoever will take them. None of this proves anyone thinks the boom is ending. Selling into strength is what these firms are paid to do, and every one of these deals is early stage and might never happen. But the timing tells you something: The most sophisticated infrastructure investors alive spent four years accumulating these assets in private, and all decided in the same two weeks that now is the moment to find someone else to own them. Four years ago these firms decided the public market was too impatient to own data centers. Now they want the public market to own them again, at 7x the price. Quite suspicious.

Every Wall Street giant that owns an AI data center is suddenly looking for a buyer. And NONE of them want to be the last one holding it. Three of them made their move in the last two weeks: Vantage Data Centers is exploring an exit. Its owners, Silver Lake and DigitalBridge, are weighing a listing at around $100 billion, or a sale, or a stake sale. It would be the largest data center IPO ever done. Three days earlier, CyrusOne started the same process. KKR and Global Infrastructure Partners met Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, and the banks pitched for roles on a listing that could come as early as 2027. Last month, Switch hired Goldman and JPMorgan to take it public at close to $80 billion including debt, possibly by the fourth quarter. Three different companies moved inside the same 14 days, and the same handful of investment banks took every call. And these are the exact same firms that BOUGHT these companies off the public market four years ago. Between June 2021 and early 2022, private equity took the data center industry private. Blackstone bought QTS. KKR and Global Infrastructure Partners took CyrusOne private in a deal worth about $15 billion. DigitalBridge and IFM took Switch private for about $11 billion. Together those deals ran past $35 billion. By 2023 there were only two pure-play data center companies left on the public market. The logic at the time was that data centers burn cash for years before they pay, and public shareholders hate that. But private money was patient, and private money could wait. Four years later, the AI boom arrived and every one of those buildings became a gold mine. So follow this: Switch went private at about $11 billion in 2022. Its owners now want close to $80 billion for it. That is roughly 7x, in four years, on the same buildings. And DigitalBridge sits on both sides of this. It owns a piece of Vantage and it took Switch private. It is now looking for the door on BOTH. The question now is who is supposed to buy. There is no bigger private buyer left to sell to. These are already the largest infrastructure funds on Earth, and the price tags now run to $100 billion. The only pocket deep enough is the public market, which means anyone with a brokerage account or an index fund. The people who bought low from the public are now organizing to sell high back to the public. And they are doing it while telling everyone the buildout is just getting started. KKR raised a record $19.2 billion for its newest infrastructure fund this month, and in June launched a separate company with over $10 billion committed to finance more construction. So one hand raises fresh billions to build more data centers, and the other hand sells the finished ones to whoever will take them. None of this proves anyone thinks the boom is ending. Selling into strength is what these firms are paid to do, and every one of these deals is early stage and might never happen. But the timing tells you something: The most sophisticated infrastructure investors alive spent four years accumulating these assets in private, and all decided in the same two weeks that now is the moment to find someone else to own them. Four years ago these firms decided the public market was too impatient to own data centers. Now they want the public market to own them again, at 7x the price. Quite suspicious.

Ricardo

70,858 views • 12 days ago

Elon just got Mississippi to pay for his $20 billion AI data center. And the state thinks they WON. This is funny, let me explain: xAI announced a massive data center in Southaven, Mississippi. Governor Tate Reeves called it "the largest private investment in state history." $20 billion. Hundreds of jobs. Economic transformation. Except Mississippi isn't getting $20 billion. They're GIVING Elon $2-3 billion in tax breaks. The fine print: Under Mississippi's 2024 data center law, xAI pays ZERO sales tax on equipment, ZERO corporate income tax, ZERO franchise tax. xAI is buying $15-18 billion in computing hardware. Mississippi sales tax is 7%. That's $1+ billion waived just on equipment purchases. Add corporate tax exemptions over the next decade and you're looking at $2-3 billion in total giveaways. For a state with a $7 billion annual budget. What Mississippi actually gets: "Hundreds of permanent jobs" (no specific number). "Thousands of indirect jobs" (construction work that ends when building is done). Tax revenue from... wait, they exempted all the taxes. So the only money coming in is property tax and income tax from a few hundred employees. In a state that already has super low tax rates. The timeline makes it obvious this was already done: Announced January 8th. Operations begin February. Three weeks from announcement to launch? They bought and retrofitted an 800,000 sq ft building BEFORE telling anyone. This wasn't a negotiation. It was a press conference for a done deal. Mississippi Development Authority said xAI "didn't ask for special treatment." Because Mississippi already created a law giving data centers everything they want. xAI just exploited it at the biggest scale yet. The name is perfect: MACROHARDRR. Opposite of Microsoft. Elon trademarked it last year. He's building a $20 billion troll to Microsoft funded by Mississippi taxpayers. What actually happens: xAI operates tax-free for a decade. Builds the world's most powerful AI supercomputer. Generates billions in revenue. Pays Mississippi nothing. Meanwhile Mississippi schools and hospitals stay underfunded. When locals complain about environmental impact, xAI points to the jobs they created. Perfect closed loop. Every other state is watching this. "If Mississippi can give away billions in taxes and call it economic development, why can't we?" Race to the bottom starts now. Elon just proved the playbook: Raise $20 billion, find a desperate state, get them to waive all taxes, build your infrastructure for free, own it forever, profit tax-free. All while media calls it "investment." It's not investment IN Mississippi. It's extraction FROM Mississippi. Mississippi gave Elon a $20 billion playground and didn't charge admission. He gets the world's most powerful AI infrastructure. They get a press release and construction jobs. Biggest corporate giveaway in modern history or genius economic development... Next 5 years will tell us. But one thing is for sure: Elon's smart as f*ck for this.

Elon just got Mississippi to pay for his $20 billion AI data center. And the state thinks they WON. This is funny, let me explain: xAI announced a massive data center in Southaven, Mississippi. Governor Tate Reeves called it "the largest private investment in state history." $20 billion. Hundreds of jobs. Economic transformation. Except Mississippi isn't getting $20 billion. They're GIVING Elon $2-3 billion in tax breaks. The fine print: Under Mississippi's 2024 data center law, xAI pays ZERO sales tax on equipment, ZERO corporate income tax, ZERO franchise tax. xAI is buying $15-18 billion in computing hardware. Mississippi sales tax is 7%. That's $1+ billion waived just on equipment purchases. Add corporate tax exemptions over the next decade and you're looking at $2-3 billion in total giveaways. For a state with a $7 billion annual budget. What Mississippi actually gets: "Hundreds of permanent jobs" (no specific number). "Thousands of indirect jobs" (construction work that ends when building is done). Tax revenue from... wait, they exempted all the taxes. So the only money coming in is property tax and income tax from a few hundred employees. In a state that already has super low tax rates. The timeline makes it obvious this was already done: Announced January 8th. Operations begin February. Three weeks from announcement to launch? They bought and retrofitted an 800,000 sq ft building BEFORE telling anyone. This wasn't a negotiation. It was a press conference for a done deal. Mississippi Development Authority said xAI "didn't ask for special treatment." Because Mississippi already created a law giving data centers everything they want. xAI just exploited it at the biggest scale yet. The name is perfect: MACROHARDRR. Opposite of Microsoft. Elon trademarked it last year. He's building a $20 billion troll to Microsoft funded by Mississippi taxpayers. What actually happens: xAI operates tax-free for a decade. Builds the world's most powerful AI supercomputer. Generates billions in revenue. Pays Mississippi nothing. Meanwhile Mississippi schools and hospitals stay underfunded. When locals complain about environmental impact, xAI points to the jobs they created. Perfect closed loop. Every other state is watching this. "If Mississippi can give away billions in taxes and call it economic development, why can't we?" Race to the bottom starts now. Elon just proved the playbook: Raise $20 billion, find a desperate state, get them to waive all taxes, build your infrastructure for free, own it forever, profit tax-free. All while media calls it "investment." It's not investment IN Mississippi. It's extraction FROM Mississippi. Mississippi gave Elon a $20 billion playground and didn't charge admission. He gets the world's most powerful AI infrastructure. They get a press release and construction jobs. Biggest corporate giveaway in modern history or genius economic development... Next 5 years will tell us. But one thing is for sure: Elon's smart as f*ck for this.

Ricardo

41,539 views • 7 months ago

The data center boom has a geopolitical shadow. Think about it- in a world where military systems run on compute, the buildings that provide that compute will become targets. And the messy part is that a lot of this infrastructure is dual-use with civilian data, banking data, cloud services, defense contracts, intelligence workloads all potentially blurred inside the same ecosystem. So if these facilities are being built next to neighborhoods, schools, and homes, people deserve to know more than “it brings jobs.” They deserve to know what kind of infrastructure they’re living next to, what risks come with it, and whether their community is secretly being folded into the map of modern warfare.

The data center boom has a geopolitical shadow. Think about it- in a world where military systems run on compute, the buildings that provide that compute will become targets. And the messy part is that a lot of this infrastructure is dual-use with civilian data, banking data, cloud services, defense contracts, intelligence workloads all potentially blurred inside the same ecosystem. So if these facilities are being built next to neighborhoods, schools, and homes, people deserve to know more than “it brings jobs.” They deserve to know what kind of infrastructure they’re living next to, what risks come with it, and whether their community is secretly being folded into the map of modern warfare.

Drey

13,996 views • 3 months ago

Big Tech is suing a tiny Ohio town of Urbana after its city council listened to the residents and voted no on a massive AI data center Urbana only has a population of about 11,000 but they’re going up against a $20 billion company The company wants to put in a data center so massive it will use 8 times the entire town’s current annual electricity usage The data center project would claim 565 acres The$1 billion AI data center would likely use an enormous amount of water, up to hundreds of millions of gallons per year For a project of this scale, the Thor Equities’ proposal annual usage could easily reach 300–1,800+ million gallons per year in water usage “The city council also put a 12-month moratorium in place on all data centers, and on June 16th, they finalized the zoning regulations that said no data centers, leading Thor Equities to file a federal lawsuit against this tiny town. Laughably, they say they look forward to resolving this so they can continue being a strong partner for Urbana” Even when residents and the city council vote for what they want, these massive companies won’t be stopped

Big Tech is suing a tiny Ohio town of Urbana after its city council listened to the residents and voted no on a massive AI data center Urbana only has a population of about 11,000 but they’re going up against a $20 billion company The company wants to put in a data center so massive it will use 8 times the entire town’s current annual electricity usage The data center project would claim 565 acres The$1 billion AI data center would likely use an enormous amount of water, up to hundreds of millions of gallons per year For a project of this scale, the Thor Equities’ proposal annual usage could easily reach 300–1,800+ million gallons per year in water usage “The city council also put a 12-month moratorium in place on all data centers, and on June 16th, they finalized the zoning regulations that said no data centers, leading Thor Equities to file a federal lawsuit against this tiny town. Laughably, they say they look forward to resolving this so they can continue being a strong partner for Urbana” Even when residents and the city council vote for what they want, these massive companies won’t be stopped

Wall Street Apes

142,981 views • 1 month ago

Taylor Lorenz on the data center backlash: "I went on Eric Newcomer's podcast recently, because I'm in this community group in LA, and they found out that there's a data center in downtown LA. It's not a hyperscale. The comments are like, this is why I've been feeling off, or my dog has cancer." "That's not to say that there aren't serious environmental concerns with Colossus and some of these. Construction can disrupt the water table. Okay, but let's have an actual conversation about it." "Everybody has lost the plot. There's no nuance, and if you talk to a lot of these people, they can't even explain what a data center is." "A lot of the outrage about the data centers is coming from people that live in Brooklyn. You're feeding people slop and chum, and you're not moving these issues forward, and we're not talking about sustainable ways to build it." Taylor Lorenz Taylor Lorenz

Taylor Lorenz on the data center backlash: "I went on Eric Newcomer's podcast recently, because I'm in this community group in LA, and they found out that there's a data center in downtown LA. It's not a hyperscale. The comments are like, this is why I've been feeling off, or my dog has cancer." "That's not to say that there aren't serious environmental concerns with Colossus and some of these. Construction can disrupt the water table. Okay, but let's have an actual conversation about it." "Everybody has lost the plot. There's no nuance, and if you talk to a lot of these people, they can't even explain what a data center is." "A lot of the outrage about the data centers is coming from people that live in Brooklyn. You're feeding people slop and chum, and you're not moving these issues forward, and we're not talking about sustainable ways to build it." Taylor Lorenz Taylor Lorenz

MTS

535,930 views • 1 month ago

I started digging into the rapid expansion of hyperscale data centers and energy projects in Ohio and what I found raised serious questions about transparency, public oversight, and who these deals are really benefiting. JobsOhio was created in 2011 and funded through the state’s liquor enterprise revenue, billions generated from public assets. Yet it operates as a private nonprofit that is not subject to traditional open-records laws. Today, Ohio is being marketed as “deployment ready” for hyperscale data centers, massive facilities that require constant, industrial-scale electricity and water usage. To support that demand, new energy infrastructure is being proposed across the state, including advanced nuclear projects like Oklo in Pike County. Policy changes like Ohio Senate Bill 52 shifted how energy siting decisions are handled at the local level, while utilities such as American Electric Power have proposed new tariffs and grid upgrades to support the surge in data center demand. Communities across Ohio are raising concerns about farmland loss, water usage, electricity costs, and the lack of early public input before these deals are shaped. Regardless of where you stand on development, one thing should be non-negotiable: Transparency. Accountability. And a real voice for the people of Ohio. Public resources and infrastructure should serve the public first. Decisions that shape our land, our water, and our power grid should not happen behind closed doors. If you care about your community, your property, and your future, now is the time to start asking questions and paying attention.

I started digging into the rapid expansion of hyperscale data centers and energy projects in Ohio and what I found raised serious questions about transparency, public oversight, and who these deals are really benefiting. JobsOhio was created in 2011 and funded through the state’s liquor enterprise revenue, billions generated from public assets. Yet it operates as a private nonprofit that is not subject to traditional open-records laws. Today, Ohio is being marketed as “deployment ready” for hyperscale data centers, massive facilities that require constant, industrial-scale electricity and water usage. To support that demand, new energy infrastructure is being proposed across the state, including advanced nuclear projects like Oklo in Pike County. Policy changes like Ohio Senate Bill 52 shifted how energy siting decisions are handled at the local level, while utilities such as American Electric Power have proposed new tariffs and grid upgrades to support the surge in data center demand. Communities across Ohio are raising concerns about farmland loss, water usage, electricity costs, and the lack of early public input before these deals are shaped. Regardless of where you stand on development, one thing should be non-negotiable: Transparency. Accountability. And a real voice for the people of Ohio. Public resources and infrastructure should serve the public first. Decisions that shape our land, our water, and our power grid should not happen behind closed doors. If you care about your community, your property, and your future, now is the time to start asking questions and paying attention.

Kim Georgeton for Lt. Governor of Ohio

14,671 views • 5 months ago

Kevin O’Leary’s Utah Megacenter: An AI Breakthrough or a Surveillance Nightmare? The Stratos hyperscale data center in Utah has become a flashpoint for growing local anger. Built on roughly 40,000 acres, it’s slated to draw up to 9 gigawatts of power. More than double Utah’s current electricity use, and over 16 billion gallons of water a year, in a state already struggling with drought. For residents, this isn’t just another tech project. It’s a massive resource drain, and a potential national security asset. A surveillance hub dropped into their backyard without real public consent. Kevin O’Leary insists the project is critical if America wants to stay ahead in the AI race and outcompete China. On the ground in Utah, ELIZABETH LANE is following the protests, the politics, and the fine print.

Kevin O’Leary’s Utah Megacenter: An AI Breakthrough or a Surveillance Nightmare? The Stratos hyperscale data center in Utah has become a flashpoint for growing local anger. Built on roughly 40,000 acres, it’s slated to draw up to 9 gigawatts of power. More than double Utah’s current electricity use, and over 16 billion gallons of water a year, in a state already struggling with drought. For residents, this isn’t just another tech project. It’s a massive resource drain, and a potential national security asset. A surveillance hub dropped into their backyard without real public consent. Kevin O’Leary insists the project is critical if America wants to stay ahead in the AI race and outcompete China. On the ground in Utah, ELIZABETH LANE is following the protests, the politics, and the fine print.

Ben Swann

11,884 views • 1 month ago

ABC News investigated and found more than 3,000 data centers are already operating nationwide At least 1,000 more planned Residents near data centers are seeing much as 50%+ increases on their electric bills “ABC7 has also been covering public meetings over proposed data centers and there are questions about water use and the environment. The i-team in ABC News studied this private company's data center map and found that there are at least 4,302 data center projects across the U.S. Large and small. Of those, 3,038 are currently operational with another 1,203 either under construction or plan for construction. 61 have acquired land. In Illinois, there are 164 operating data centers with another 81 planned for construction. The largest state project plan is in Yorkville. It would be 2 gigawatts and according to the ABC7 data team would use the same energy that would power approximately 1.7 million homes more than every home in the city of Chicago.”

ABC News investigated and found more than 3,000 data centers are already operating nationwide At least 1,000 more planned Residents near data centers are seeing much as 50%+ increases on their electric bills “ABC7 has also been covering public meetings over proposed data centers and there are questions about water use and the environment. The i-team in ABC News studied this private company's data center map and found that there are at least 4,302 data center projects across the U.S. Large and small. Of those, 3,038 are currently operational with another 1,203 either under construction or plan for construction. 61 have acquired land. In Illinois, there are 164 operating data centers with another 81 planned for construction. The largest state project plan is in Yorkville. It would be 2 gigawatts and according to the ABC7 data team would use the same energy that would power approximately 1.7 million homes more than every home in the city of Chicago.”

Wall Street Apes

152,195 views • 6 months ago

🚨 KYRIE IRVING WARNED US ABOUT BILL GATES STEALING OUR WATER — AND NOW IT'S GETTING WORSE NBA pro Kyrie Irving tried to warn us years ago. He said it's "weird" that Bill Gates owns a ton of land and water in the U.S. Now in Utah, Kevin O’Leary just got approval for a $100 billion AI data center in the desert. One facility that will use more energy than the entire state in a year and further drain the shrinking Great Salt Lake. There are no federal limits on how much water data centers can use. At the same time, Kyrie also talked about how celebrity culture is fake... that a lot of famous people are just “NPCs” acting and don’t stand on any real principles. Jim Carrey has said similar things in the past. Kyrie was called crazy for saying all this. Now it’s all playing out in real time. What do you think... was Kyrie onto something?

🚨 KYRIE IRVING WARNED US ABOUT BILL GATES STEALING OUR WATER — AND NOW IT'S GETTING WORSE NBA pro Kyrie Irving tried to warn us years ago. He said it's "weird" that Bill Gates owns a ton of land and water in the U.S. Now in Utah, Kevin O’Leary just got approval for a $100 billion AI data center in the desert. One facility that will use more energy than the entire state in a year and further drain the shrinking Great Salt Lake. There are no federal limits on how much water data centers can use. At the same time, Kyrie also talked about how celebrity culture is fake... that a lot of famous people are just “NPCs” acting and don’t stand on any real principles. Jim Carrey has said similar things in the past. Kyrie was called crazy for saying all this. Now it’s all playing out in real time. What do you think... was Kyrie onto something?

HustleBitch

440,811 views • 1 month ago