Massive Data Center Planned For The New Mexico Desert: What It Means For Water Scarcity
A debate is emerging in New Mexico following the approval of Project Jupiter, a gargantuan data center slated for construction in the Chihuahuan desert. The data center will be home to the well-known tech giants Oracle and OpenAI.
At roughly 1,400 acres, the facility will be more than 1.5 times the size of New York City’s Central Park. Its approval has drawn both strong community support and skepticism over its environmental footprint, particularly its impact on regional water scarcity.
Proponents point to the economic benefits that the project promises, including “creating thousands of well-paying jobs for construction and ongoing operations, driving infrastructure investment, and generating hundreds of millions in new revenue for local governments.”
Conversely, critics question the logic of placing a resource-intensive facility in an arid landscape. Ahmed Saeed, a data center expert at Georgia Institute of Technology, calls the site selection “bizarre.”
According to a 2023 study, an AI chat session of 20 or so queries could use up to a bottle of freshwater. To combat those fears, Oracle switched its planned power source from water-intensive natural gas turbines to fuel cells. The data centers’ cooling systems will use recycled water within a closed-loop system – as a result, additional water use would be rare.
Oracle emphasized that the public’s drinking water supply would not be affected, other than office water use such as kitchens and bathrooms. They compare the projected water use to that of a typical office building.
Furthermore, Project Jupiter has committed to investing $50 million to repair and upgrade local water systems, and “support long-term water stewardship in Doña Ana County.”
Developers now project that the data center will utilize 11 million gallons of non-potable, recycled water annually.