- Jake Garfield, deputy director for the Utah Office of Energy Development, told a legislative interim committee that Utah is a “national leader” in smart data center policy.
- New technologies pioneered in Utah allow for less water consumption — or no water consumption at all — to cool data centers, including the Novva Data Center and Valar Atomics’ waterless reactor.
- Though this technology exists, Utah representatives question why there is no policy enforcing the use of less consumptive systems.
Utah’s 48 operational data centers — with more on the way — can consume anywhere from a couple thousand to a couple million gallons of water per day.
With the shrinking of the Great Salt Lake, a governor and citizens worried about preserving air quality and limiting water usage, and amid a growing national backlash, many oppose the construction of data centers entirely.
Jake Garfield, however, remains optimistic.
“Utah is a leader in smart data center policy — a national leader,” said Garfield, the deputy director for the Utah Office of Energy Development.
At a meeting of Utah’s Economic Development and Workforce Services Interim Committee on Wednesday, Garfield said that though traditional data centers use a tremendous amount of water, “that is changing rapidly and it’s particularly changed here in Utah.”
While Utah continues to move forward with data center projects, other political leaders across the country have put on the brakes.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul instituted a statewide moratorium on data centers in July, while Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro signed an executive order this week installing strict guidelines for data center construction.
Other state executives and candidates running for office have rushed to say how they would regulate the industry.
The National Republican Senate Committee warned its candidates in a memo reported on Wednesday by Axios, that the “toxic brand” of data centers was hurting the Republican candidate for Senate in Ohio, Jon Husted.
“This has become a sleeper issue for the entire election cycle,” the memo said.
In Utah, data centers are seen as partly to blame for a drop in job approval ratings for several statewide political leaders, including Gov. Spencer Cox. Also, a massive data center project in Box Elder County was blamed for the primary loss of Utah state Senate President Stuart Adams.
Emerging technologies
As the politics of data centers grows more complicated, Utah state lawmakers looked at ways to regulate the growing industry.
For many residents of the state, amid a record-breaking drought, major concerns revolve around data centers’ use of water.
Garfield pointed to the Novva data center in West Jordan, which opened in September 2021.
The center was called a “pioneer” in using a closed-loop cooling system, one never used in the U.S. before.
Closed-loop technology is a system where the water used to cool the servers is circulated through a sealed loop, being used time and time again, rather than being used once and discarded. Because it is sealed, very little water escapes or is evaporated.
Garfield said the data center created a water savings “that’s almost hard to fathom.”
“The cooling system that they used was initially charged with 55,000 gallons of water. That was in 2021 when the data center opened,” he said. “Since that time, they’ve had almost no water loss.”
If the data center had used the traditional evaporation cooling method, Garfield explained, they would have used up to 300 million gallons each year — for more than five years.
Since its construction, Novva’s competitors that were building data centers in other desert regions across the country also started implementing closed-loop cooling technology, eventually becoming standard in some of those regions, Garfield said.
“I think we can be very proud as Utahns that this type of water technology was pioneered here in Utah and has made a huge difference around the country,” he said.
Another example he pointed to was Valar Atomics’ partnership with Nvidia. The two companies plan to build a mega data center — one that doesn’t require water at all.
The data center, built in Emery County, stands amid an arid region suffering an intense drought.
“This data center will be powered by a Valar Atomics reactor,” Garfield said. “Valar Atomics reactors use no water at all — they are cooled by an inert helium gas system.”
Nvidia is also creating a chip technology, one which uses a closed-loop cooling system that will withstand higher temperatures.
Between these two systems, “there will be no overall water use other than the initial water needed to charge in system,” he said.
Lack of legislation
Although these new systems offer various benefits to Utah’s environment, data centers are not legally required to use them.
When asked by Utah Rep. James A. Dunnigan, R-Taylorsville, if new facilities have to use closed-loop systems, Garfield admitted, “There are not currently any requirements in statute or rule to use a closed-loop system.
“The market forces are pushing data centers in that direction because of the cost of water in the United States, in Utah and the improvements in closed-loop systems.”
Dunnigan then speculated that wealthy operators could simply bypass these technologies by purchasing existing water rights.
That means businesses with deep enough pockets could avoid conservation efforts entirely by purchasing rights to use water on the open market.
Garfield also confirmed that Utah is not forcing existing, traditional data centers to switch to less consumptive systems, saying, “We do not currently have a push or a mechanism to push these traditional data centers using more water in a direction of using closed-loop systems.”
Without legal requirements to utilize less consumptive systems, Utah’s data centers could continue depleting the state of its water, millions of gallons at a time, even as the Great Salt Lake reaches historic lows.