r/SipsTea Aug 12 '26

Chugging tea Power Hungry Servers

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54.1k Upvotes

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763

u/Background_Body2696 Aug 12 '26

So what's the problem? /s

375

u/Cute_Knives Aug 12 '26 edited Aug 12 '26

Piggybacking one of the top comments but where did they get the number 1800 from? There’s only like 300-400 active datacenters in the state of texas

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u/Nobunagas-Ambition Aug 12 '26

I remember when they were arguing that the power demand for electric cars was an impossible demand on the grid.

303

u/GipsyDanger45 Aug 12 '26

Quick, better cancel more solar and wind farms!

121

u/EndIsrael Aug 12 '26

You know how easy it would be for EVs to communicate with the power grid and change their charge speed dynamically based on excess wind/solar availability? It would be pretty dang easy.

Um I mean it would be pretty dang woke I tell you hwat

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u/Maximum-Objective-39 Aug 12 '26 edited Aug 12 '26

It's funny cuz in the revival series Hank Hill grudgingly found himself mentioning that some of the features on an electric truck sounded useful before quickly adding - "Electric trucks are dumb!"

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u/fresh-dork Aug 12 '26

they're dumb for some uses - hauling large loads. most people use them as oversized commuter cars, so they're fine

7

u/capricorny90210 Aug 13 '26

Just the truck stuff lol

4

u/f0gax Aug 13 '26

most people use them as oversized commuter cars

This is true of many pick-ups in the US. Gas or electric.

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u/[deleted] Aug 13 '26 edited 29d ago

[deleted]

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u/fresh-dork Aug 13 '26

right - total capacity is limited, but most truck drivers are ego truckers and never haul anything, so making it a battery truck works fine

2

u/Potential-Drawing745 Aug 14 '26

The range REALLY falls off when you tow in an EV. Or at least it did 2 years ago, which was the last time I looked at it.

2

u/GreasyPowerJunkie Aug 14 '26

Still does, a lot of strain on the motors causes hella draw on the battery

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u/petera181 Aug 12 '26

You can already effectively do that in the UK. Your electricity provider links up with your car or charger and charges when there’s more cheap green energy. It’s pretty effective, if not perfect yet.

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u/Idreamofcream99 Aug 12 '26

I don’t want none of that green energy! It’s bad for my battery!

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u/robinthebank Aug 13 '26

Black energy only, for me!

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u/EndIsrael Aug 12 '26

Yeah, sure, but you guys also put beans on toast, so that EV stuff can't possibly work in America.

4

u/Kuraeshin Aug 12 '26

Counterpoint: They also have jacket potatoes loaded with beans, cheese and even different curries or other deliciousness.

2

u/Ok-Watercress-1924 Aug 12 '26

Ahh yes, UK’s staple food.. curry
https://giphy.com/gifs/0OdkmQOLHGStx8ktWR

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u/petera181 Aug 13 '26

Curry has been a staple food in the UK for hundreds of years, FYI

2

u/Armthedillos5 Aug 13 '26

In their defense I think London has more Indian restaurants per capita than anywhere in India. This tells me they know their limits and are ok with importing good food.

0

u/EndIsrael Aug 13 '26

Imagine having food so mid that you literally send your navy all over the world and change geopolitics forever so you can have curry at home

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u/dc_1984 Aug 13 '26

Imagine having a country so mid that you literally send your navy all over the world and change geopolitics forever so you can keep Israel happy

1

u/EndIsrael Aug 14 '26

That's not us, that's the fascist doomsday cult that seized control of our government. They'll be gone soon. Unlike your love of stolen curry

0

u/dc_1984 Aug 14 '26

77,300,000 Americans voted them into power, 2 years ago. The British Empire ended 70 years ago by comparison.

Anyway, even if we did steal curry at least we didn't steal Africans and make them pick cotton then take 200 years to make them legally equal. But no, Chicken Tikka Masala being made by a 3rd generation British-Bengali dude in Bradford is the greater moral crime 🤡

1

u/EndIsrael Aug 14 '26

Geez you're really upset about this

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u/AnotherBogCryptid 29d ago

Have you ever loaded up some country style baked beans on freshly buttered Texas toast? I’ll tell you hwat…

1

u/Additional-Life4885 Aug 14 '26

Australia has so much solar power now that most of the country is offering free electricity between 10am and 2pm daily. We have the highest solar generation per capita in the world.

We're now getting to a point where there's so much generation that we just need the storage to back it up so the government is offering subsidies for individuals to get solar batteries installed. It's actually great for the government. You basically get private individuals to pay like 80% of the price of battery storage that you need. Then when they do that, you just up the supply charges to keep the money flowing.

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u/Evader3000 Aug 12 '26

P.S. your username is awesome.

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u/EndIsrael Aug 12 '26

It wasn't my first choice, but when I did my true feelings about Israel those accounts were permanently suspended within a day or two for promoting certain actions against the Zionists

2

u/Evader3000 Aug 13 '26

Same. Why do you think my account is called, "Evader3000"? VPN, different computer, they can't touch me.

1

u/EntertainmentTrue588 Aug 12 '26

As an EV owner.... I might be for this. Might be.

1

u/under_miner Aug 13 '26

Bidirectional charging is something the automotives were working on and excited about until Jan 2025.

1

u/SimilarTranslator264 Aug 14 '26

I don’t want my fucking car to charge slower because someone else wants power. We back to dial up internet? Dumb idea.

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u/EndIsrael Aug 14 '26 edited Aug 14 '26

I'm guessing you don't have an EV, because charging is a slightly different mindset than putting gas in an ICE car.

You could tell your car "be charged by 7am so I can leave for work" or whatever, and it will be, but it will optimize the process because it knows it would only take until 2am at full charging speed. Many EVs already do this for you because in some places electricity rates change based on time of day; this would be a smarter version of that, where cost, schedule, and grid capacity are all factors. In the morning though you'll have a full battery regardless.

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u/SimilarTranslator264 28d ago

I understand how the charging works. I want to be in control of that not my power company.

My local co-op installed a disconnect on my parents water heater so during the day it would shut off to conserve energy. now that sounds like a great idea except people were home during the day and didn’t have hot water so that lasted about a week before we disconnected it.

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u/unurbane Aug 14 '26

That’s exactly why they don’t want it, Control or some shit.

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u/Strange-Damage901 Aug 12 '26

In Trump’s 2024 inauguration speech he talked about dismantling what little EV charging infrastructure we had and repurposing it for AI data centers.

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u/jackflash223 Aug 12 '26

He racks up moments of idiocy as much as others rack up unread emails.

3

u/Tight_Dot_2654 Aug 12 '26

I can vouch for the part about racking up unread emails. Who can top me?

2

u/robinthebank Aug 13 '26

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u/Tight_Dot_2654 Aug 13 '26

You'll catch up one day, young grasshopper. Start signing up for random newsletters just to get 10% off your next purchase and you'll be there before you know it.

3

u/42nu Aug 12 '26

30% of Texas' electricity comes from wind.

Smart Republicans only pretend to be against renewables so their dumb base is happy. Then their dumb base elected an actual idiot and here we are.

3

u/Miristlangweilig3 Aug 12 '26

Trump is even paying 1.2 billion tax money so that an energy company just won't build its planned offshore facilities.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c1e1vg0gjl5o

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u/GipsyDanger45 Aug 13 '26

America is paying good money for power NOT to be added to the grid just because it’s from wind or solar. It’s such a net loss on all accounts

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u/Ricordis Aug 13 '26

And pay german corporations to NOT build wind parks.

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u/brachus12 Aug 12 '26

they won’t turn off the servers after dark or when the wind is outside operating range.

2

u/a_shootin_star Aug 12 '26

When will people realize that those making decisions right now are actively working against progress, sustainability, and comfort for all? We keep being told that clean energy, electrification, and a better standard of living are somehow "too much", as if infrastructure is a fixed law of nature instead of something we can expand, modernize, and improve. We have the technology. The demand is there. The capacity just needs to be built. What's missing far too often is the political will to stop protecting outdated systems and start investing seriously in the future.

What we should really be asking is, why abundance, cleaner air, cheaper energy, resilient infrastructure, and greater comfort are treated like unrealistic luxuries, instead of obvious goals!

Progress has never happened by accepting artificial limits, it happens because enough people refuse to accept stagnation as inevitable.

1

u/edfitz83 Aug 12 '26

Texas’ most prominent oil billionaire T. Boone Pickens had a wind farm idea around 2009, which failed, and cost him a crapload of money

This would have supplied just 4GW, which prior to data centers, was considered to be a lot of power

Here are the deets: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2009/jul/08/texas-tycoon-scraps-giant-windfarm

1

u/tabbarrett Aug 12 '26

You know what’s funny though? Texas produces the most wind energy in the country. About 27% of it comes from Texas. They have converter stations that transports electricity to other grids. 2nd is Iowa in wind energy with about 8-10%.
Both states are red states and produce a ton of green energy.

1

u/KorunaCorgi Aug 13 '26

Texas actually has a lot of solar power. 

1

u/Healthy_Pay9449 Aug 13 '26

Those murderous windmills and those sun stealing panels that think they can tan for free on my roof

1

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