A Boring Dystopia

The project, brought by “Shark Tank” TV personality Kevin O’Leary, would span 40,000 acres, demand 9 gigawatts of power once completed, and raise the state’s carbon emissions by 64 percent, according to estimates. While its water needs remain unknown, the sprawling data center would neighbor the northernmost tip of the shrinking Great Salt Lake, which will likely hit a record-low elevation this year following an unprecedented dry winter.

It could also create a massive heat island capable of devastating the area’s ecology, said Robert Davies, a physics professor at Utah State University. Davies estimated that the finished project would cover about as many square miles as Washington, D.C., making it the largest data center on the planet, and that it could produce enough heat to spike nighttime temperatures by as much as 28 degrees Fahrenheit in the high-desert valley.

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The entire project will actually produce roughly 16 gigawatts of thermal energy, according to Davies. It starts with the massive on-site power generation, which will generate 7 to 8 gigawatts of waste heat just producing the needed electricity for the data center, since gas plants are only about 57 percent efficient.

And once that electricity reaches the data center, every watt will turn into pure heat, because anytime a gadget consumes power, it converts it into heat, Davies explained, whether it’s a toaster, a car, or a sprawling rack of computer servers.