AI mega projects raise alarm in some of Europe’s driest regions

Europe’s ambitious artificial intelligence strategy is at risk of colliding with an often overlooked but critically important environmental issue: water scarcity.

The European Union has big plans for data center expansion, announcing in April that it intends to at least triple its capacity over the next five to seven years as part of a push to become a world-class AI hub.

The rapid rollout of data centers, which power all aspects of the digital economy, from social media and online banking to AI tools like ChatGPT, has sparked some concern — particularly in regions already facing water scarcity.

The issue is especially acute across southern Europe, with around 30% of the population known to be situated in areas with permanent water stress. This refers to a situation where the demand for water exceeds the available supply during a specific period.

Data centers typically require large quantities of water to keep them from overheating.

Major tech companies like Amazon, Microsoft and Meta have invested billions of U.S. dollars in new facilities in Spain, for instance, while Google has plans to develop three hubs in Greece’s Attica region.

Kevin Grecksch, associate professor of water science, policy and management at the U.K.’s University of Oxford, told CNBC that plans to build data centers in water-stressed areas across Europe reflects a lack of integrated thinking from policymakers.

“AI is a buzzword and the talk of the town,” Grecksch said. “So, national and regional politicians try to get their hands on it, and it sounds as if you’re investing into the future, creating a few new jobs — but sustainability seems to be an afterthought.”

Grecksch said the rapid rollout of data centers across the region throws up plenty of unanswered questions, such as, given that in most jurisdictions public water supply has priority over everything else, what happens if data centers are shut down in a drought scenario? He conceded he had no answer to this prospect.

“Data centres tend to be built in arid or semi-arid climates because that’s the preferred environment for servers; yet those areas tend to be subject to water scarcity or drought prone as well,” Grecksch said.

A spokesperson for the European Commission, the EU’s executive arm, said policies of the European High Performance Computing Joint Initiative (EuroHPC JU) include selecting hosting sites for AI factories based on criteria that prioritizes energy efficiency and environmental sustainability.

“Green computing will continue to be pursued through energy-efficient supercomputers optimised for AI, using techniques such as dynamic power saving and re-use techniques like advanced cooling and recycling of the heat produced,” the spokesperson told CNBC by email.

The EU referenced the new “JUPITER” supercomputer in Jülich, Germany, as “a prime example of European excellence” in addressing energy efficiency, saying the system runs entirely on renewable energy and features “cutting-edge” cooling and energy reuse.

In Aragon, an area of severe water stress in northeastern Spain, Amazon is planning to open three data centers. The proposal, which the U.S. tech giant says will create thousands of jobs, has sparked tension between local farmers and environmental activists.

In the U.K., the small English village of Culham has been picked as the first of the British government’s so-called AI “growth zones.” The designation of the Oxfordshire site, which is situated close to one of the country’s first new reservoirs in 30 years, has raised fears that it could put further pressure on local water supplies.

Nick Kraft, senior analyst at political risk consultancy Eurasia Group, said “extremely arid” and high-water stress localities were being targeted across Europe for further data center development.

“Complicating the matter is the fact that the most common understanding of data center water usage, and typically what companies report on when communicating with local stakeholders, is on-site water use — or the water used for cooling in data centers,” Kraft told CNBC by email.

“This despite more than half of data centers’ water footprint being off-site, occurring in energy generation and semiconductor manufacturing,” he added.

There are emerging signs that data center operators are maturing in their water stewardship, Kraft said, but assessing the full water footprint of these projects is expected to remain a major challenge.

Analysis published by S&P Global last month said the data center industry’s average exposure to water stress is projected to be high in the 2020s, with southern European countries such as Spain and Greece among the locations forecast to face the most water stress.

Michael Winterson, secretary general of the European Data Centre Association (EUDCA), which represents the interests of the European data center operator community, said water consumption is a concern that the industry takes seriously.

“Water treatment and collection is now normal for us. And there are continual innovations in this space that reduce energy required, reduce water needed and are fast approaching near zero chemical treatment,” Winterson told CNBC.

The “next big thing” the EUDC wants to do in Europe, Winterson said, noting that the region typically lags the U.S. in this space, is to get non-potable water feeds, referring to water that is not safe for drinking but can be used for other industrial processes.

“This reduces chemicals and energy used to get water and keeps potable water for its primary purpose,” he added.

For their part, many data center operators, claim that it is the energy-intensive nature of their technology that pushes them to consider sustainable innovations. Companies often use water usage effectiveness (WUE) as a metric for identifying water efficiency in data centers, however the metric poses its own limitations.

Microsoft has been trialing data center designs that it says consumes zero water for cooling and Start Campus said it’s Sines facility in Portugal achieves a WUE of zero by recycling seawater through its sytems.

The EUDC’s secretary general also sought to highlight the importance of data centers to the region’s digital economy.

“This is trillions of dollars of GDP and millions of technology jobs in Europe alone — which in average pay significantly higher salaries than national average wages. A 20 [megawatt] Datacentre uses the similar amount of water as a golf course! How much GDP do golf courses create? What kind of jobs?” Winterson said.

European lawmakers have previously warned about the region’s growing water crisis, saying there is a pressing need to tackle issues such as scarcity, food security and pollution at a time when Europe is the fastest-warming continent on the planet.

The European Environment Agency, for its part, said late last month that the region’s water resources are currently under “severe pressure,” with water stress affecting one-third of Europe’s population and territory.

When factoring in the explosion of AI demand, Laura Ramsamy, climate and hazard lead at data analytics platform Climate X, said the rollout of new hyperscale data centers in already water-stressed European areas “is really exacerbating the problem.”

In the Netherlands in 2022, for instance, Meta paused its plans to build a large data center in the region of Zeewolde amid objections over environmental concerns, particularly high power and water consumption.

Ireland, which has long embraced the rollout of data centers to facilitate an AI boom, also recently came under scrutiny from environmental groups, with many of these hubs concentrated in the Dublin area.

Notably, the Netherlands and Ireland have both imposed effective bans on new data centers over the coming years due to concerns over grid capacity and their environmental impact.

A spokesperson of Ireland’s Department of Climate, Energy and the Environment said the construction and operation of data centers have “positively contributed” to the Irish economy over the past decade.

“As with all sectors of our economy, the operation and development of data centres are underpinned by Ireland’s legally binding climate objectives and the need to maintain robust energy security,” the spokesperson said.

“It is understood that the largest data centres in Ireland primarily operate air cooling rather than water cooling systems. This differentiates Ireland from many global data centre locations,” they added.