Kevin O’Leary says data centres use less water than golf courses. The numbers are more complicated.
TL;DR
O’Leary compared data centre water use to golf courses. Golf uses 4.6x more today, but data centre demand could overtake it by 2028 on current projections.
Kevin O’Leary is making the golf course argument again. The “Shark Tank” investor, whose 40,000-acre Stratos data centre project in Utah sparked protests and a governor’s executive order, told Business Insider that AI data centres consume far less water than America’s golf courses. The comparison is technically correct today. The Golf Course Superintendents Association of America estimates US courses use 2.08 billion gallons of water per day for irrigation. US data centres use roughly 449 million gallons per day for cooling, according to the Florida Water & Pollution Control Operators Association.
That is a 4.6x gap, and O’Leary is not wrong to point it out. But the two curves are moving in opposite directions. Golf course water use is flat or...
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