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Re: Northern Virginia has had enough with data centers


From: Joel Halpern <jmh () joelhalpern com>
Date: Fri, 23 Jun 2023 18:41:38 -0400

I will note that the grid in Loudoun county (arguably the center of the Northern Virginia data center boom) has actually gotten a LOT better than it was when I first moved here.  Some of that was rebuild started before the surge, due to just how bad it was.  But I am fairly sure that some of it is a side-effect of the build itself.

Yours,

Joel

On 6/23/2023 6:17 PM, Sean Donelan wrote:

Northern Virginia has about 275 data centers

The noise complaints are about HVAC fan noise (24-hour droning) from cooling towers or roof top farms of evaporative condensers.

The water complaints are about the one-use water cooling towers

The electric grid complaints are about the demand on the grid making the entire region less stable and proposed construction of new high-voltage tower corridors for data centers.

And if you didn't know, some VC-funded companies can be a**-holes and not known for being good neighbors or anything besides making money.

And yes, I helped design & build several early data centers in NOVA :-)

https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2023/02/10/data-centers-northern-virginia-internet/


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