Data centers make nearby neighborhoods hotter

https://coloradosun.com/2026/07/03/data-centers-make-nearby-neighborhoods-hotter/

by gnabgib • 16 days ago

6 3 16 days ago

I largely don't find that surprising. Industry and mechanical activity (cars) cause direct warming - see "urban heat islands", "weekend temperature effect", and as a bonus the "weekend ozone effect". The latter two aren't necessarily as consistent as the former.

But what I do find surprising is

A separate study by an international team of researchers found that data centers outside urban centers raised the surrounding area’s temperature by 2 degrees Celsius on average and, in some cases, by up to 9 degrees Celsius.

9 degrees F would be already be wild, but 9 C sounds crazy! I wish I could figure out what source they were talking about, but I haven't been able to.

kbelder• 16 days ago

9 degrees F would be already be wild, but 9 C sounds crazy!

Honestly, that shifts me firmly into the "I don't believe that for a second" territory. If anybody can actually show the studies with measurements where that happened, though, I'd be interested.

pseudohadamard• 16 days ago

They obviously used this, https://www.theguardian.com/science/the-lay-scientist/2010/s..., as their guide on how to write up the story.

Having said that, the original source for the story was the very first search result for "data centres 9 degrees celsius": https://www.newscientist.com/article/2521256-ai-data-centres.... And it's in New Scientist so there's proper data, and a link to the actual publication, which is https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.20897.

Data centers make nearby neighborhoods hotter

Related Stories