Published October 5, 2026

Data centers are not inevitable

Denali Sai Nalamalapu

My state is the data center capital of the world, and the people have had enough.

This comic is published in partnership with The Revelator.

This comic is published in partnership with The Revelator. It was edited for The Revelator by John Platt.

This comic was edited by:

Sources

50 office spaces https://www.epa.gov/newsreleases/energy-star-expands-efforts-improve-energy-efficiency-us-data-centers
3-5 million gallons of water per day for cooling https://vcnva.org/bill-of-the-day-data-center-growth/
Heat nearby neighborhoods by as much as 4 degrees F https://news.asu.edu/20260518-environment-and-sustainability-turning-down-heat-data-centers
Constant, low-frequency noise https://www.sierraclub.org/ohio/blog/2026/02/data-centers-noise-pollution-ohio-communities-are-organizing-accountability
Size of 150 Walmart Supercenters https://www.pecva.org/work/energy-work/mitigating-data-center-developments-impacts/
$2.4 billion per month https://ourworldindata.org/how-much-is-the-us-spending-on-building-data-centers
do not bring many permanent jobs https://thenevadaindependent.com/article/do-data-centers-create-few-permanent-jobs
County administrator is tearing up https://virginiabusiness.com/google-botetourt-data-center-purchase/
8th largest data center complex in the world https://cardinalnews.org/2026/07/09/by-water-use-googles-botetourt-site-would-be-its-8th-largest-data-center-complex-in-the-world/
12 Olympic-sized swimming pools https://scienceline.org/2010/02/what-would-you-do-with-eight-million-gallons-of-water-every-day/
Government and companies have an insatiable need https://wtop.com/virginia/2026/07/how-virginia-became-the-worlds-data-center-capital-and-how-its-going/
72% of Virginia voters oppose the state-wide tax exemption for data centers https://wjla.com/news/local/virginia-spanberger-popularity-vcu-poll-election-commonwealth-university-abigail-democrats-economy-data-centers-grocery-store-costs-of-living-impacts-business
73% of Virginia voters blame data centers for rising energy bills https://ccanactionfund.org/media/New-Polling-on-Virginians-Views-of-Data-Centers-and-Rising-Energy-Costs.pdf
A map of the United States with data centers https://cleanview.co/data-centers/us

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