Willie Nelson has spoken out against the construction of data centers across the United States and issued a statement encouraging citizens to fight the proliferation of facilities that “only destroy the environment around them.” The country legend posted an open letter on social media describing how he grew up in Abbott, Texas, and that the
America’s largest power grid has struggled to cope with an onslaught of data centers. Now, after an auction to add more generation capacity failed, grid operator PJM Interconnection has said it will take data centers and other large users offline during power outages. The decision comes as the breakneck pace of data center construction has
AI search is quickly becoming the default option, whether users like it or not. In just one year, Google’s AI-generated search responses, known as AI Overviews, have gone from appearing in 15% of searches to 43%, according to a new report, driving a shift in the way web users consume information online. In a recent
Artificial intelligence has a huge appetite for electricity and South Australia is stepping up to feed the beast. ASX-listed clean energy company 1414 Degrees has just announced a major deal to build a massive AI data center campus near Port Augusta. The company has signed a master agreement with an Australian data center operator to
Iamnitchi is one of several disinformation researchers who told WIRED that despite having the legal right to obtain data from platforms under EU law, they face obstacles, obfuscation and, in some cases, court battles to obtain it. Last year, the law was expanded to increase access for researchers, but it is the implementation, not the
This week a power line went down outside Washington, DC. Normally, the grid would only need a few seconds to recover from such an event. But this took more than 10 minutes because more than 3 gigawatts of data centers stopped consuming power almost simultaneously. The event caused voltage on PJM’s grid to spike from