5 ms·

What’s wrong with this?

ipaddr 8mo ago
Price of power goes up and the local people are not connected to the benefits. You might think they will receive a lot of money in taxes but you would be wrong because they have tax breaks.
- sparky_z 8mo ago
  Why would adding a new supplier to the market cause the price of power to go up?
  - myrmidon 8mo ago
    Because on-site powerplants owned by datacenter operators are not "just another supplier". The threat is: This "datacenter power" disincentives buildout of "free" powerplants (by eating up significant demand at very low margins thanks to basically vertical integration); this slows down buildout of "normal" infrastructure (possibly both grid connectivity and power), and the electrical energy market becomes worse for consumers than it is now. I personally think all of this is very speculative for now, but allowing industry to rely on the grid (which they still would!) while almost exclusively "buying" their own power is a risky proposition from a consumer perspective.
    - soulofmischief 8mo ago
      Not to mention the danger of energy production, even nuclear, becoming resource-constrained to the point where datacenter power plants leave no room for municipal plants. We're seeing it happen with consumer hardware; make no mistake on who will get preference.
    - PunchyHamster 8mo ago
      I'm sure power plant building companies won't say no to more business
tomrod 8mo ago
Grid overload if they produce too much base load. Interconnection expenses. Same issues as with mining and large industrial clients generally.
- simianwords 8mo ago
  so no companies should build anything even if they attempt to pay for the externalities. this is just nimbyism.
  - jfengel 8mo ago
    "Attempt" is doing a lot of work there. Companies are driven by a profit motive, and are practically required to renege on promises that are not legally enforced. In a different world they would have earned trust and deserve the benefit of the doubt. This is not that world.
  - tomrod 8mo ago
    You'll notice that I did not advocate against building and grid reconfiguration. Indeed, my company does microgrids. I do, however, believe strongly in being aware of tradeoffs. In short, I'm very much in favor of building the right solution to a problem. I am unsure what cognitively triggered an unhealthy response of "this is NIMBYism!" and would welcome a follow up comment to understand your train of thought.
  - mike_d 8mo ago
    No they should not. They should donate that money to non-profit public utility operators instead.

Price of power goes up and the local people are not connected to the benefits. You might think they will receive a lot of money in taxes but you would be wrong because they have tax breaks.

sparky_z 8mo ago
Why would adding a new supplier to the market cause the price of power to go up?
- myrmidon 8mo ago
  Because on-site powerplants owned by datacenter operators are not "just another supplier". The threat is: This "datacenter power" disincentives buildout of "free" powerplants (by eating up significant demand at very low margins thanks to basically vertical integration); this slows down buildout of "normal" infrastructure (possibly both grid connectivity and power), and the electrical energy market becomes worse for consumers than it is now. I personally think all of this is very speculative for now, but allowing industry to rely on the grid (which they still would!) while almost exclusively "buying" their own power is a risky proposition from a consumer perspective.
  - soulofmischief 8mo ago
    Not to mention the danger of energy production, even nuclear, becoming resource-constrained to the point where datacenter power plants leave no room for municipal plants. We're seeing it happen with consumer hardware; make no mistake on who will get preference.
  - PunchyHamster 8mo ago
    I'm sure power plant building companies won't say no to more business

tomrod 8mo ago

Grid overload if they produce too much base load. Interconnection expenses. Same issues as with mining and large industrial clients generally.

simianwords 8mo ago
so no companies should build anything even if they attempt to pay for the externalities. this is just nimbyism.
- jfengel 8mo ago
  "Attempt" is doing a lot of work there. Companies are driven by a profit motive, and are practically required to renege on promises that are not legally enforced. In a different world they would have earned trust and deserve the benefit of the doubt. This is not that world.
- tomrod 8mo ago
  You'll notice that I did not advocate against building and grid reconfiguration. Indeed, my company does microgrids. I do, however, believe strongly in being aware of tradeoffs. In short, I'm very much in favor of building the right solution to a problem. I am unsure what cognitively triggered an unhealthy response of "this is NIMBYism!" and would welcome a follow up comment to understand your train of thought.
- mike_d 8mo ago
  No they should not. They should donate that money to non-profit public utility operators instead.