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Interviews Available: Food & Water Watch Senior Researcher Oakley Shelton-Thomas

Washington, D.C. – A new analysis from the national environmental organization Food & Water Watch points to the alarming climate impacts of an untempered buildout of AI data centers in the U.S. This comes as communities across the country are increasingly mobilizing against data center construction and alarm bells are sounding across society about the many dangers posed by out-of-control AI development.

Our analysis finds that the amount of electricity currently required to power existing hyperscale data centers in the U.S. generates 150.6 million metric tons of carbon dioxide per year – the equivalent more than 35 million cars, or 11.5 percent of all domestic passenger travel. Yet if all the proposals for new data centers currently being pursued by the industry were to come to fruition, the total estimated climate emissions would rise to a staggering 39 percent of all car travel in the country by 2035.

“The AI data center explosion is already increasing fossil fuel pollution at a time when we must be rapidly reducing these emissions to stand any reasonable chance of a livable climate future. A bigger buildout of data centers across the country would be a death sentence for climate stability,” said Oakley Shelton-Thomas, senior researcher at Food & Water Watch. “Amid alarming concerns about a doomsday AI takeover of humanity, the greatest threat from Big Tech may very well be its unshakable bond with climate-killing fossil fuels.”