Overview
- Tech companies have moved this week to explain and reduce water impacts as scrutiny grows, with Google, Amazon and Microsoft publishing reports and Nvidia promoting liquid‑cooling designs that it says can sharply cut on‑site cooling water use.
- Google reported consuming 7.2 billion gallons of freshwater in 2024 and said it replenished about 4.5 billion gallons, while Amazon reported roughly 2.5 billion gallons withdrawn in 2025.
- Investors filed shareholder resolutions in April asking Google, Amazon and Microsoft to disclose site-level water and power use for U.S. data centers, signaling demand for location-specific transparency beyond corporate totals.
- Analysts warn most of a data center’s water footprint is tied to the electricity that powers it, with a Bank of America estimate putting electricity‑related water at about 75 percent, which shifts some impacts upstream to power plants.
- Public opposition and policy moves are already reshaping projects as communities, state lawmakers and the U.N. press for tighter permitting, site disclosures and local reviews that could delay or alter where new centers are sited.