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Michael Vardon, Associate Professor of Environmental Accounting, Australian National University

UNBELIEVABLE: How much water and power will ai data centres use in australia ironically we dont have the data to know | History Defined

Daniele Levis Pelusi/Unsplash, CC BY-NC-SA

Australia’s data centre rush now rivals the mining boom. OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman last week said Australia could become a “data centre capital of the world”.

This would come at an environmental cost. Water use is a common concern. One report estimates AI centres could use billions of litres of water a year.

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