Data Center Buildout

In February, residents in San Marcos packed city hall for eight hours to fight a proposed data center that would have pulled more than 25 million gallons of water a year from the river the town is named after. One protester wore a blow-up salamander costume, a nod to the endangered Texas blind salamander that lives in those springs. A crowd of hundreds sang and chanted outside. Inside, resident after resident told the council to reject the zoning change the project needed. The council voted it down. ...

I want to step away from the usual format of this blog for one post. No records request, no lawsuit filing, no city council agenda item. Just something I’ve been chewing on for a while now, and a conversation tonight that finally put it into words I could write down. The pattern under the pattern If you’ve read this blog for any length of time, you’ve seen the shape by now. Flock cameras. Zencity scraping social media sentiment. Cell-site simulators bought with forfeiture money. Kyle Bass and a private equity firm trying to pull billions of gallons out of an aquifer an entire region depends on. Data centers justified as a national necessity while they draw down water and power with almost no local say in the matter. ...