Gerry McGovernMay 10

A data center drained 30M gallons of water unnoticed — until residents complained about low water pressure

Residents in Fayetteville, Georgia, noticed low water pressure last year. The utility discovered two unaccounted-for water connections at one of the nation’s largest data center campuses.

“We get this notification from Fayette County water system saying you need to stop watering your lawns to help conserve water."

https://www.politico.com/news/2026/05/08/georgia-data-centers-water-00909988

A data center drained 30M gallons of water unnoticed — until residents complained about low water pressure

Residents in Fayetteville, Georgia, noticed low water pressure last year. The utility discovered two unaccounted-for water connections at one of the nation’s largest data center campuses.

Politico
Show threadjoschiMay 10

@gerrymcgovern There was an interesting analysis of the article on Bluesky.

https://bsky.app/profile/andymasley.bsky.social/post/3mlhq73tovk2i

Andy Masley (@andymasley.bsky.social)

When the utility noticed the problem, they sent the data center a retroactive bill for all the water, for $147,474 covering ~29M gallons. The data center paid it. That's all that happened.

Bluesky Social
Show thread707Kat

@joschi Nothing out of that man's writing is interesting. He's an Effective Altruist on big techs payroll.

Literally a speaker at "Data Center World" conference. https://schedule.datacenterworld.com/speaker/masley-andy/82093

Andy Masley | Speakers | Data Center World

Andy Masley from Effective Altruism DC was a speaker at Data Center World 2026.

Data Center World
May 10 at 10:36pmWeb