BRFR Cake Stop 'breaking news' miscellany

[Psamathe]

Hang on a minute... shouldn't the data centre companies and homebuilders pay for their water needs and add it to their bills for their customers?

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https://www.theguardian.com/business/2026/aug/13/water-bills-suppliers-spending-england-wales-ofwat

Listening to The Rest is Politics podcast with Caroline Lucas and it seems Data Centre have some magic priority. When it comes to water supplies apparently they have priority over domestic supplies so you could be collecting bottles from some car park whilst nearby data centres take and evaporate away the limited water.

And Government are apparently planning significant new Data Centres in already water stressed regions.

To me there may be an argument about the impact on the economy if we don't have these data centres but maybe the real question becomes whether we have an economy or country if we blindly waste our limited finite resources destroying the climate we and our economy depend on.

 

[First Aspect]

Listening to The Rest is Politics podcast with Caroline Lucas and it seems Data Centre have some magic priority. When it comes to water supplies apparently they have priority over domestic supplies so you could be collecting bottles from some car park whilst nearby data centres take and evaporate away the limited water.

And Government are apparently planning significant new Data Centres in already water stressed regions.

To me there may be an argument about the impact on the economy if we don't have these data centres but maybe the real question becomes whether we have an economy or country if we blindly waste our limited finite resources destroying the climate we and our economy depend on.

There's a fairly good argument that data centres should be compelled to use closed loop cooling water systems. But since this is Britain, we will not insist on that, and legislate for it later, once the problem has been created.

 

[Pross]

zoom.earth is a useful place to look. It does appear that a big chunk of Wales was under the pall of the various fires at 4pm yesterday

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This is from NASAs Firemap Live

It seems to be a particular issue in Wales and South East Wales in particular which I suspect is due to easy access to mountains from well populated areas (some of which aren’t the nicest of places). That said bits of Yorkshire and Lancs are similar but don’t seem to have a major issue.

 

[Psamathe]

Listening to The Rest is Politics podcast with Caroline Lucas and it seems Data Centre have some magic priority. When it comes to water supplies apparently they have priority over domestic supplies so you could be collecting bottles from some car park whilst nearby data centres take and evaporate away the limited water.

And Government are apparently planning significant new Data Centres in already water stressed regions.

To me there may be an argument about the impact on the economy if we don't have these data centres but maybe the real question becomes whether we have an economy or country if we blindly waste our limited finite resources destroying the climate we and our economy depend on.

There's a fairly good argument that data centres should be compelled to use closed loop cooling water systems. But since this is Britain, we will not insist on that, and legislate for it later, once the problem has been created.

Am I right in thinking that would increase their energy needs/costs? And if it would, my impression is it's likely below marginal commercially anyway (AI being sold as a good idea looking for an application/income given there are only a limited number of images you can create of Burnham in a bikini).

 

[icowden]

Are they each 3.7 acres?

Typo :-)

 

[Pblakeney]

Listening to The Rest is Politics podcast with Caroline Lucas and it seems Data Centre have some magic priority. When it comes to water supplies apparently they have priority over domestic supplies so you could be collecting bottles from some car park whilst nearby data centres take and evaporate away the limited water.

And Government are apparently planning significant new Data Centres in already water stressed regions.

To me there may be an argument about the impact on the economy if we don't have these data centres but maybe the real question becomes whether we have an economy or country if we blindly waste our limited finite resources destroying the climate we and our economy depend on.

Said it before, data centres will be a future scandal.
Best get it sorted by legislation right now.