[ExI] Where should we build new multi-gigawatt AI Data centers?

[spike at rainier66.com]

…> On Behalf Of John Clark via extropy-chat
Subject: Re: [ExI] Where should we build new multi-gigawatt AI Data centers?

 

The local opposition to new AI data centers in the USA has started to worry me, so I asked GPT another question. 

 

ME: What are the prospects of building multi-gigawatt AI Data centers in Canada? John K Clark

 

 

>…GPT: " Canada is potentially one of the world's best locations for enormous AI data centers. In some respects, I think it has a better long-term opportunity than Iceland because it combines abundant freshwater, a cold climate, enormous hydroelectric resources, and a much larger land area and electricity system…

 

 

Alaska is better than Canada.  If hydroelectric power is used to power data centers, it runs up the price of power to locals: hydro is inherently limited.  If we could even find a suitable river without dams, the environmentalists will fight like demons to keep it that way.

 

Alaska has cold water available to dump the waste heat without need for fresh water: use a closed loop cooling system with a heat exchanger to dump waste heat directly into seawater without evaporation.  Burn natural gas or coal, which can be set up quickly.  A gas turbine is noisy but way out there in the Aleutian Islands, that doesn’t matter.  Hauling coal out there is not a show stopper.  

 

>From what I can tell, the limiting factor in Alaska is communications: being way out there in the sea suggests signals would need to come and go via satellite.  This could be done if we had one hell of a lot more satellites carrying signals.  This can be arranged.

 

Alaska is better than Canada for AI: the Canadian government cannot be trusted to keep its greedy paws off of the data centers.

 

spike

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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