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Like golf courses in the desert. (... Palm Springs has around 100 golf courses)
by simonw 17d ago
Like golf courses in the desert.
(... Palm Springs has around 100 golf courses)
- kragen 17d agoWhile we're talking about Americans using anything but the metric system (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49746745 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49746745), how many golf courses' worth of water is Google's 10.9 billion "gallons" a year?
- zahlman 17d agoChatGPT tells me > As a historical U.S. benchmark, an average 18-hole facility had about 80.7 irrigated turf acres and used approximately 152.5 acre-feet/year—about 49.7 million gallons (188 million litres) annually. So about 220. But it's still, ahem, a drop in the bucket compared to the California almond industry.
- simonw 17d agoA while back I satirically suggested https://simonwillison.net/2026/Jul/17/spot-birds-not-golf/ https://simonwillison.net/2026/Jul/17/spot-birds-not-golf/ that if hyperscalers wanted to relieve the pressure over data center water use they could buy up a few dozen country clubs and turn them into public parks. (I was only half joking)