Articles Posted in Water

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As demand for data centers continues to accelerate, water availability is emerging as a critical factor in project development and long-term operations. Although power supply and transmission access have historically dominated siting discussions, increasing water constraints in many regions are placing greater focus on the substantial volumes of water required to support data center cooling systems. As we covered previously, data centers are frequently located in areas already experiencing water stress and require substantial volumes of water to operate—roughly 228 billion gallons in 2023 in the United States alone—with water use projected to increase by up to 170% by 2030.

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GettyImages-1339237217-300x200As data center development continues to expand—driven by demand for artificial intelligence, cloud computing and other digital infrastructure—the use and availability of water have emerged as a key consideration. As discussed in our prior article, the scale of water use associated with large data center operations is drawing increasing scrutiny as a primary policy concern for data centers. While factors such as the size of the facility, the design of its cooling system and local climate conditions will affect the water volumes necessary for operations, large data centers may require as much as five million gallons a day, comparable to the municipal demand of smaller cities. As a result, water sourcing and reuse are becoming central to both operators and local, state and federal government officials tasked with regulating and legislating on these issues.

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water-data-centers-scaled-e1772147361532-300x217As AI-driven data center development accelerates, developers, communities and regulators are increasingly focused on water demand—both the volume required and the sources from which that water will be drawn. While industry attention has largely centered on electricity procurement and grid impacts, the availability and legal entitlement to a firm water supply has become equally material to siting, permitting and community acceptance. Particularly as surface and groundwater supplies become increasingly constrained and new projects are sited in regions experiencing tighter hydrologic conditions or growth-related supply constraints, project teams are increasingly integrating water supply analysis into early-stage development to address issues that can materially affect schedule, financing and long-term operations.

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GettyImages-2145412338-300x200We all need water to survive—but access to the liquid lifeline isn’t always a given. With a shifting climate and ever-increasing agricultural and industrial demands on this limited commodity, UNICEF predicts that by 2025, half of the world’s population could be living in areas facing water scarcity. On top of the obvious resource drains, many countries are losing surprising amounts of potable water to leaks. For example, in the United States alone, an estimated 6 billion gallons of treated drinking water seep out of its supply every day due to aging pipelines and undetected leaks.

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It is clear that these have been busy months for federal environmental regulators, especially those working at EPA, the federal departments and the Council on Environmental Quality. Even the Department of Agriculture has found itself coping with greenhouse gases (GHG) issues in its administration of the laws applicable to agriculture and the national forests. The ambitious scope of the current “all of government” approach may be discerned after learning how many disparate federal agencies are employed in implementing this policy. So many actions have been proposed or completed that some state officials are experiencing “comment fatigue” because they are being overwhelmed by the scope, size, and complexity of these federal initiatives. The Environmental Protection Agency is, of course, at the forefront of these actions and activities, as described below.

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This is a brief survey of many of the environmental and regulatory laws passed by the Texas Legislature and signed by the Governor in the 88th Regular Session of the Legislature, which ended in May 2023, although a special session has been called to address lingering matters. Altogether, more than 1,000 laws were enacted in this session, including a surprising number of water-related environmental bills.

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Making good on a promise to redefine the Clean Water Act (CWA) term, “Waters of the United States” or WOTUS, on January 18, 2023, the latest revised definition of “Waters of the United States” was published in the Federal Register by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (ACOE) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) at 86 FR 3004. The effective date of this rule was on March 20, 2023. Remarkably, this action marks the fourth time in eight years that these agencies have attempted to craft a workable definition of WOTUS and thereby affect far-ranging impacts on everything from infrastructure and agriculture to private land use. While the agencies indicate that the newly redefined WOTUS is, in many ways, a return to the longstanding regulatory regime, there are several notable changes.

Read more in Seeking Certainty: Redefining “Waters of the United States” by Anthony B. Cavender and Ashleigh Myers.

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GettyImages-water-treatment-300x200As demand increases for low-carbon technologies to power the energy transition, the acquisition of critical materials—so-called given their integral role in the transition of energy activities—is becoming increasingly important. As described in our previous post, such critical materials include rare earth elements (REE), lithium, nickel and platinum group metals. In short, the transition endeavors to reduce use of one non-renewable resource—fossil fuel—by significantly ramping up our use of other non-renewable resources. While critical material discussions have largely centered on the availability and economic extractability of the minerals themselves, Pillsbury is also counseling on the other resources needed to bring the materials to market at the scales required for our decarbonization goals.

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