South DFW News

The town of Red Oak finds itself at an economic crossroads in which the debate draws a blurry line between progress and preservation.

Google and a new data center to be built by 2021 would service Dallas, which is 20 miles away. Data centers are placed near large populations to both serve the cloud community and keep up with competition. While Google promotes itself as energy-efficient, Time reports the tech giant keeps its water use a secret. Conservation groups and lawsuits have learned it uses billions of gallons annually including in 2019, when the company requested or was granted more than 2.3 billion gallons of water for centers in three different states.

The company relies on “evaporative cooling,” which uses evaporation to cool the air around processing units inside data centers. Times reported while evaporative cooling uses less energy, but the process requires more water than an alternative computer room air conditioner. The company released an environment report in 2019 detailing how reducing its energy use makes it water-efficient.  

There is usually a trade-off according to experts.

“If the water consumption goes down, energy consumption goes up and vice versa,” Otto Van Geet, principal engineer with National Renewable Energy Laboratory told Time.

For Red Oak, water conservation is never far from its consciousness. On its website under voluntary water conservation, the city indicates it receives half of its water supply from the City of Dallas. Dallas, in turn, has requested its recipients use voluntary conservation measures as its six reservoirs are 18% depleted. The city’s Stage 1 for its Drought Management Plan will be enacted should the reservoirs become 35 percent depleted.

In Red Oak, Google is requesting 1.46 billions gallons a year to keep its data center computers cooled. It also reported Ellis County, which consists of Red Oak and approximately 20 other towns, will use 15 billions gallons this year, emphasizing the impact the company will have on the water supply.

The demands have evolved into a petition filed by Google, according to Time. Google is seeking permission to bypass the local Rockett Special Utility District of its right to supply water and find another provider. It said the company confirmed it could not meet supply. The utility has responded in court.  It replied Google has paid to perform a report to determine if it can meet its needs, but the report has not been turned in.

Google said it wouldn’t need all the water requested but wanted to make sure there was enough for periods of high demand or particularly hot weather, according to Time.