Climate Goals Go Up in Smoke as US Datacenters Turn To Coal (theregister.com)
- Reference: 0179744798
- News link: https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/10/10/1514208/climate-goals-go-up-in-smoke-as-us-datacenters-turn-to-coal
- Source link: https://www.theregister.com/2025/10/10/datacenter_coal_power/
> According to a research note from financial services firm Jefferies, datacenter operators are racing to connect new capacity to the electrical grid, with accelerated load growth expected during the 2026-2028 period. This spike in demand is driving an unexpected resurgence in coal generation, which has increased nearly 20 percent year-to-date.
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> The research note, seen by The Register, states: "We raise our estimate for coal generation by ~11 percent (driven by higher capacity factors), and staying elevated through 2027 on favorable fuel pricing vs gas (particularly for existing fleet)." Warnings emerged last year that rising energy demand from the proliferation of data centers in the US risked outstripping available generation capacity, potentially extending the operational life of coal-fired power plants.
Further reading : [2]India Needs Coal For the Next Decade and Nobody Wants To Say It .
[1] https://www.theregister.com/2025/10/10/datacenter_coal_power/
[2] https://indiadispatch.com/p/india-grid-cannot-keep-up-with-its-ambitions
Gee (Score:4, Insightful)
Let's need a TON more electrical power to spend on technology that's power hungry and hasn't proven to be truly useful (or for that matter even profitable) yet. Sounds like a GREAT idea for everyone involved!
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Gotta launder for the drug dealers and scammers somehow.
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The main increase in datacenter power consumption right now is due to AI, which is what I was referring to as "power hungry and hasn't proven to be truly useful."
As far as your second sentence, I don't subscribe to the "too big to fail" theory for anything. I'm sure people said the same think about tulips back in the 17th century. It wasn't true then, and it isn't now.
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No it isn't, unless you are a crook.
If it all collapsed tomorrow most of us wouldn't even blink; or care.
When We Ask AI... (Score:2)
... to come up with a solution to global warming and it tells us "you're screwed" and then cuts humanity off from most power sources so that AI can save itself, what will we do then?
Half joking. Only half.
AI downfall (Score:2)
AI will be the downfall of humanity, but not because its super smart, because we are super dumb.
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I for one welcome our robot overlords.
Maybe we'll finally have dictators that prioritize survival of the entire planet over some short-term profit.
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Maybe we never get there and kill ourselves trying.
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To quote Dark Helmet: "Evil will always triumph, because Good is dumb"
Have you ever wondered... (Score:2)
really why all the billionaires are building spaceships?
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So we can pack them all in and launch it untested?
\o/ (Score:1)
Buy now, pay later.
We gave up our tungsten lamps for this?! (Score:2)
We gave up our tungsten lamps with their beautiful light... for this?!
Fuck this. Nah. Vayance todos al carajo con esta mierda.
Fucking tech bros man, two-faced liars.
Save energy! Conserve! All these tech bros preaching, and the instant they seize on another way to make money fast, they burn up all their so-called "ethics."
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Really, the tech bros are humanity in a microcosm. Why do you think humans invented religion? (whether it was revealed by divine revelation or created out of thin air, I'm not saying. But ultimately when humans preach they are 'inventing' their scriptures, however they get the inspiration.) But the athiest left says 'oh no, anything goes' so what do you expectd?
coal, etc (Score:1)
I live in the anthracite coal region of Pennsylvania. We have a bitcoin miner nearby operating what was a defunct coal powered power plant. They were burning tailings from nearby mines, and are now working on permits to burn tires.
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> and are now working on permits to burn tires
Wait, you are saying you need a permit to burn tires?
On a totally unrelated note, can you put out a rubber fire with water?
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Come to Haiti. No permit needed to burn tires.
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Wait, you are saying you need a permit to burn tires? ,/EM>
If you don't want to dump all the burning toxins into the air, yes. Or don't you breathe where you come from?
Money talks, climate change walks (Score:2)
This should demonstrate everyone what Big Tech really thinks about Climate Change.
Best time was 30 years ago, 2nd best time is now (Score:2)
The best time to have been building nuclear power plants for this expected growth in electrical generation demand was 30 years ago, the 2nd best time is now, to paraphrase a point on planting trees. It's not like we didn't see this coming, demand for energy was always going to grow.
A couple points to make clear. First, this demand for electricity isn't driving the building of new coal power plants, but rather delaying their retirement. From the fine article:
> Warnings emerged last year that rising energy demand from the proliferation of data centers in the US risked outstripping available generation capacity, potentially extending the operational life of coal-fired power plants.
That still means more coal burned, so no need t
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> We will need to be building nuclear power plants at a rate double or quadruple that we saw at the peak of building nuclear power plants in the 1970s to keep up with growing demand.
The current AI craze has not resulted in profits. Just massive amounts of money thrown into building something that shows no sign of becoming profitable despite every company trying to ram it into every product and service they can. It does show every sign of being a bubble that will eventually pop in the not-to-distant future.
Building nuclear plants at the rate you suggest would be another way to throw massive amounts of money into building things that will never be profitable because the power demand wo
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Wyoming is an interesting case. Data centers that have big NG-fired backup generation can connect to the grid only if they turn dispatch of those backup generators over to the grid operator. In high-demand intervals, the operator runs the backup generators rather than bringing in high-cost power from distant generators. Or runs them for frequency control if that's necessary.
There's been at least one case of a data center that signed the contract to allow the operator to run their NG-fired generation.
sounds like an job for Nuclear power (Score:2)
sounds like an job for Nuclear power
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Takes too long to build out. Shareholders demand a return in only a few years.
I'd really like to hear the justifications (Score:2)
Just for once, I'd like to hear the tech bros say something definitive about global warming and their role in it, and about what they foresee as the future of humanity outside of the enclaves they will build to protect themselves from the consequences of climate change and from the wrath of the rest of us.
Seriously, I'd like to hear their honest thoughts - or an admission of their lack of thought - about where all this is going. I want to know - absent the propaganda, spin, fantasies, and utter lies - what
Climate change secondary, local effects primary (Score:2)
Coal presents more-immediate problems than climate change. Coal ash isn't your friend. You can set up (or restore/reuse old) natgas operations without doing much to bother the locals around the site of generation. Coal is . . . different.
Make data centers pay SURGE pricing. (Score:2)
Those same corporations would do it to you in a heartbeat. They are already pushing up electricity prices for everyone.
It's a shame government is owned by the corporations or we could actually say no they can't build another data center.
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Next you will be claiming that the right don't intend violence and want to solve problems peacefully.
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Don't feed the trolls, particularly the ones like this who almost certainly work at a troll farm in some other country.
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Coal is violence.
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Violence?
Not at all, "You take the coal, clean it...", somebody orange said this.