Episode 2: Borrowed Land, Borrowed Water, Borrowed Time

Artificial intelligence feels invisible. But the digital economy runs on very physical things: water, land, energy, minerals, labor, and infrastructure.

In this episode of Panic With A Purpose, Nhi and CJ unpack the environmental relationship between technology and natural resources - from AI data centers and water scarcity to cobalt extraction, deep sea mining, data sovereignty, and who actually gets to decide where this infrastructure gets built.

Some of the things we talk about:

• Why AI infrastructure uses absurd amounts of water and energ
• The politics of data centers, extraction, and “innovation”
• Whether technology is saving us or speedrunning ecological collapse
• Why literacy, local organizing, and asking annoying questions actually matter

Also included:
existential dread, accidental comedy, Scooby-Doo voices, and at least one deeply concerning statistic.

This is the first episode in a larger series exploring the environmental footprint of AI and digital infrastructure.

To learn more, visit https://www.nuatlas.org/podcast

📚 Sources referenced in the episode HERE
💬 Leave your thoughts, corrections, or questions in the comments or use https://www.nuatlas.org/contact-us

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Show cast and crew:
Hosts and creators: Nhiyc (Nhi Corcoran) & CJ the EJ Guy (Charles Knoble) 
Producer: Joanna Jastrzebska
Editor: Maxine Beceril

Disclaimer:

Acknowledging our bias:
This episode was written by our team operating primarily in Global North contexts, using English-language sources, with easier access to Western frameworks and examples. We're aware this creates blind spots.

Our attempt at accountability:
Actively seeking examples from Global South, particularly communities on extraction frontlines
Centring resistance from those most impacted by climate and data extraction
Acknowledging when we lack information rather than generalising from limited examples
Inviting correction and contribution from global listeners
Committing to ongoing learning and updating this brief as we learn more

What we're not doing:
Claiming objectivity (impossible. all research has perspective)
Treating Global North frameworks as universal or superior
Using Global South examples only as victims/problems rather than leaders/solutions
Assuming our audience shares our context
Pretending we can represent experiences we haven't lived

If you hear gaps, misrepresentations, or have examples we've missed: tell us. We want this to be a conversation!

Transcript

AI Isn’t “In the Cloud”

Nhi 0:08

Okay, I mean it's it's up to you. I was just gonna say hey my peeps, but uh CJ's gonna introduce the podcast.

CJ 0:17

Cut print. Welcome back to Data. Data. Yeah. Wow, the strongest open. All right. We had it. Welcome back to Panic with a Purpose. This is a Nū Data podcast where we talk about climate, technology, and justice. And I talk with my hands.

Nhi 0:47

And I well, I also talk with my hands. So there's yeah, there's no rebuttal there. Um welcome back to the show slash podcast slash. We're not really sure what to call this because it's both visual and audio. Um, but today CJ and I thought that we could speak about um the environmental relationship uh between our resources and our technology, specifically for artificial intelligence. So the digital blah blah blah blah blah motherfucker. Sorry. The digital economy runs on, you know, like physical stuff, right? Environmental stuff, land, water, energy, rare earth minerals. Um so there is no cloud without, you know, our water supply, there's no AI or internet or any other really technology without um data center big broad strokes, of course. Um, and of course, there's also no data centers without a place to put it on and plug it into the grid, which again is talking about land. So the tech that's consuming these resources is also the tech that's being deployed to monitor, manage, and protect them, which is kind of ironic. So, for example, AI is predicting flash floods, um, satellite imagery is tracking deforestation in real time, also, you know, telling us about the weather forecast. Um, and so machine learning uh is really intertwined in everything that we're using. So, our question that CJ and I wanted to investigate today is uh this is technology accelerating ecological breakdown, or is it our best shot at managing it? Um and does that question even make sense in the binary? Um, which is, now that I think about it, really, really fucking meta, and I'm a little bit uh my panic scale is a little bit higher now.

CJ 2:50

We're gonna break it down. It's gonna be fine. It's it's all good. Everything's panicky, and that's cool. The meta is kind of where we seem to exist anyways. I think some of the key questions we're gonna be talking about then is we're gonna be diving into things like who decides where the data centers are getting built? Uh is the AI that we're talking about going to solve everything? And is that a credible argument to begin with, or is that just a deflection of the underlying problem? Are there smaller, more efficient models that are going to be the solution to all of these problems? Who bears the cost of extraction? Is tech as problem versus tech as solution the right frame to begin with? And what does the AI build-out look like from the global south in particular? Because we're so often focused on the global north.

Nhi 3:39

Yeah, so those are the key questions we're going through today. Um, I am very proud of us for doing a shit tone of research, which we may or may not forget to reference in this conversation. So don't fault us, but there will be a sheet of citations in the description for you to read up on later. And if there are any corrections, we will also post um that in directly that sheet for you.

The Malthusian Swerve & Techno-Optimism

Nhi 4:12

So I think to start us off, CJ, I wanted to ask if you knew about what the Malthusian fuck, I can't even fucking pronounce it, girl. The thing that that was coined by Jeff Guo is, I hope you don't, because it kind of defeats the purposes of talking about this.

CJ 4:31

I'm not gonna lie to you, I know that Radio Lab episode. That that episode absolutely takes me away.

Nhi 4:37

Okay, so you do know, but I guess this is for the benefit of also the audience. Oh, okay, never mind. I should not have changed our.

CJ 4:46

No, that's the one that I put in the dock.

Nhi 4:49

Yo! All right! Okay, never mind. Switch it, just switch it up.

CJ 4:53

That's so good. That's so good. No, wait. I never heard of that before. Tell me more.

Nhi 4:58

Okay, so uh the swerve, the idea of the swerve is that throughout human history, we push ourselves to the brink as a species by burning through resources, but then make a last-second technological breakthrough that saves us. So maybe we're just deepening our water resource debt, which we'll talk about a little bit later, uh, to hit that next breakthrough. And I wanted to get your opinion on that, except, you already thought about it because you put it in the dock.

CJ 5:28

But I think about this all the time. Which is why I put it in the dock, because I'm always thinking about it. It feels like such an excuse to be like, yeah, we'll figure it out. We human beings, we always figured it out. Here we are, still existing after so many things have gone wrong in history, and yet humans have survived. That's not the reason to keep making things worse, to be fair. You know? I'm like, I we have also we have come to the brink of extinction in a lot of different ways. And sometimes those resource edges that we have pushed ourselves to are like, we cut down all the trees and now we're running out of lumber. What are we gonna build our houses out of? We'll figure it out. This is we are getting rid of all of the drinking water on the planet that we need to be able to actually live. That feels like we're pushing to a new brink at a new speed with new problems. And instead of we needed this to build our houses, this is we needed this to be able to turn my grandma into a dog. Like it does feel like this is a very different universe that we're living in rather than just we gotta get more wood, we're gonna run out of wood.

Data Centers, Droughts & Water Panic

Nhi 6:45

You know, but that's I think that's the the issue that we're running into by measuring economics with just GDP, right? One single metric, as if you know, we have an exponential amount of resources that we can replenish and the earth can reabsorb in terms of harm and and waste and garbage, um, which is why we talked about planetary boundaries very briefly in the previous episode. Um because we are operating in that sort of constraint. So actually, a really funny slash not so funny example of the swerve. Is it of the swerve or is it just it's a rebuttal of the swerve? Okay, I'm just gonna say it so everybody understands and sees the context. Is this so in Aragon? Aragon, again, Lord of the Rings, Spain, Amazon's largest European data center requires 500 million liters of drinking drinking water per day. Okay, so water that would otherwise have gone to households um or be consumed by human beings is being consumed by tech. So in December, yeah, it's super yeah, makes sense. So in December 2024, Amazon applied to increase its permits up to 48% from that 500 million liters, which is uh like what the actual fuck. Um so right following, like the following year, um not even four months later in March 2025, Aragon asked the EU for drought aid because exactly because of the permitting that increase allowed Amazon to increase the water usage. So a citizen campaign called Tu Nube Seca Mi Río, which is your cloud is drying my river, is calling for uh moratorium on new data centers to avoid this. Now uh this is fucked up to me. It makes me panic ridiculously because most uh planning meetings are public that you as a citizen can attend, but usually no one knows about it, or we're too busy panicking about other things, not existential things, like you know, roofing over our heads and groceries, etc. Um, petroleum prices that this kind of like slips under the radar, or before uh when Microsoft, before they pulled their NDAs, which is you know, um for government contracts to negotiate like where data centers are being built in the terms, um we wouldn't have known these data centers would have just been built and the water consumption, the land um takeover would have just we would have just had to live with it. I mean, sometimes we still do a little bit. This is why we're talking about this today. But yeah, so that was my little fun, not fun, scary fact.

CJ 9:40

Oh, that's so not fun. A 50% increase from what they started at is such a crazy ask in the immediate follow-up to we need drought protection, is the most horrifying combination of events that I've ever heard. That is that has actually got my heart pumping a little bit more. Like that that is a terrifying thought that this was the ask was we need more, and also y'all screwed, but like you'll be fine, figure it out. This is a scary thing, especially to think that they they pulled if they were pulling out you know these local community meetings where they said, come through and tell us what you think. It was not we're going to ask for this much water, and then we're gonna ask for more, and then there's going to be a drought, but y'all will probably be fine. There was not this much information, I bet was disclosed as this is all happening too. This is not something that even if you show up to these meetings, I feel like you can see that far ahead because they're not going to be providing that information up front. Luckily, people are picking up on this now. People, when they think of data centers, often are thinking about the water usage or thinking about the resource drain. But what a terrifying thing to show up and be like, sounds like they're gonna be making a data center. Good for jobs, anyways.

Nhi 10:50

I that voice reminds me of like an episode of Scooby-Doo. But we'll differ different thing. You should become a voice actor.

CJ 11:03

Um I was I was Maurice in Beauty and the Beast. I'm a super good old man, actually.

Nhi 11:08

Oh, dang. Okay, CJ won't promise to do the entire episode in that voice, but you know, this is this is good. This is good for entertainment and less you know to mitigate the panicky stuff that we're talking about. Um, and also for those who are new here, we usually do front load all of our panic, but then of course, you know, the whole point of having this conversation is this we do it with purpose. Um, and there are always actional pathways that follow. Always.

CJ 11:36

Always. Always some actions.

Nhi 11:42

As much as we can put. Um so you know, talking about water, the UN declared the a global water crisis, um, right, that the demand is projected to exceed supply by 40% by 2030, which is like what four years away, what the fuck? Um, and two billion people currently lack access to safe drinking water, and that brings us that brings us back to the data center or the hardware side of uh technology. I'm not gonna even say AI and machine learning because there's like AI data centers, there's data centers for the interwebs, there's manufacturing, there's the shit in your phone, cobalt, you know. Um okay, my dude, I like literally blanked out on the minerals. Cobalts, nickel, copper, lithium, manganese, I think is the is the other one. Yes that we make.

CJ 12:38

Manganese, not magnesium.

Nhi 12:40

Yer. We probably need magnesium in our soils, though. It's kind of better for our bodies, but we don't have nutrients in our topsoil. Anyways, um so we're in our water prices. Um, and data centers are super water intensive by design because they need the cooling systems, actually need um potable or kind of pure forms of water, and they use I think the least effective cooling uh methodology, which is evaporative cooling, where you like do the ps and then they're like oh my god, because actually I don't know if the sound effects are like that.

CJ 13:22

I'm pretty sure that's actually exactly what it sounds like. The water is just absolutely screaming on its way out.

Nhi 13:28

Water's not a fan. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's true. But also production of the chips, right, for data centers also consumes a shit ton of um of water. So, for example, like in the Southern Taiwan Science Park headquarters, they use up to like 99,000 tons of water daily, bitch. Okay, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to call you a bitch.

CJ 13:55

Didn't see that coming. That's that one totally undermined the stat. Say it again.

Nhi 14:01

I'm sorry. 99,000 tons of water. Oh my CJ. No, it is, and you don't get this. So the stat is from uh it's the 99,000 tons was measured in the same year that Taiwan experienced the worst drought in like 56 years. That's in 2021. And so the government had to truck water to residents whilst protecting their semiconductor production because it's a huge part of their economy. And of course, like two-thirds of data centers built in the US are then, you know, it's a couple on top of that, uh, since 2022 are built in water-stressed areas. So let's do a temp check. What is your panic level right now?

CJ 14:53

Oh, it's getting higher so fast. Water feels so abstract sometimes, where you're just kind of like, there's water everywhere. We'll kind of figure it out. And I think when I was young, there was a part of my brain that said desalination is the solution to all things. We'll just make salty water, not salty water. It's never that simple. That potable drinking water is such a rarity on this planet, and it is so easy for us to waste it in so many different ways. And I feel like I'm wasting it when I leave the water on when I'm brushing my teeth. And you're telling me that we're going to these drought regions and we are just throwing water into the sky and saying goodbye. Be gone, build our ships for us. It is that is a terrifying thing to be thinking about. So I'm panic is going up. Panic is not going down so far. It is all up.

Nhi 15:43

Okay, one more thing to add it for you know to go up. And and then we'll probably talk about how it could go down um later. Is side note is I have this problem with flushing the toilet. Okay, I don't have a problem with flushing the toilet. I think it's hygienic. You should flush the toilet. Um that's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about we're using potable pure water to flush the toilet. When we could be using recycled gray water to flush toilets, like from rain catching, uh, from you know, your laundry machine, etc. So, anyways, so I'm just like, you know, obviously technology, the toilet flushing is also a type of technology, but obviously not the one we're talking about today.

CJ 16:34

No, but straight enough, that feels like an easy, an easy switch. I'm like how much the how much the amount that we care about what the water in the toilet looks like beforehand is an issue for us. It's something that is absolutely stopping us from just switching over to something that is recycled water that would that would be less harmful taking away from the potable water that we are working with. That is actually a crazy thought. I don't know how I never thought of that.

Nhi 17:05

Yeah, I so when I was taking my permaculture uh design course, this is like we were talking about alternative ways to like recycle water, and this is, you know, like I was so focused on this point because I thought it was so absolutely ridiculous. Um, but so that brings us to maybe something to lower your panic. Um because now we're still talking a little bit about water, but afterwards I'd love to hand it over to you, CJ, to talk about minerals. Is um we can do recycled or closed loop water systems to cool our data centers, which would reduce you know water consumption a lot. And then there's also immersion cooling systems, which we can deep dive on um to later. And now I realize saying that we forgot to introduce that this is a part of a series. We will do the deep dives later.

CJ 18:01

We will go deeper. It will be deeper.

unknown 18:06

Enhance, enhance, enhance, enhance, enhance, enhance.

CJ 18:11

Dang it.

Nhi 18:13

That's okay.

CJ 18:13

Um, so we just pause real quick do it. Yeah, we can do it again. We're gonna forget. 100% gonna forget.

Nhi 18:20

Yeah, it's cool.

CJ 18:23

100% gonna forget.

Nhi 18:24

So liquid immersion cooling is actually the most efficient way. So basically, um, in the simplest of terms, is you got the big tanks and you submerge your entire like equipment in the data centers inside these liquids that don't deteriorate the actual tech that simultaneously cool them down. Now, they are initially more costly to cur um build and maintain, but in the long run, we it's actually more efficient and effective cost-wise and ecologically. I mean, I will argue with uh, you know, shareholders about this, but you know, obviously, you know, they want a return, so we're we're not gonna go in into that. Um but regardless of like the cooling, I think my question is how much water does AI actually use? Because it's so obscure, right, when we're doing this research. I don't and and how do when do we start measuring the consumption of the water from the fabrication of the chips? Or like what do we do?

CJ 19:38

When we're talking about that whole life cycle from that top to bottom, it's kind of a crazy thought that there is water consumed at every stage, and often insane amounts of water, and that that water is often lost in one form or another, contaminated or evaporated, or and so trying to measure that feels like a scary thing, which is probably also why companies aren't doing it. They don't want to report on these things because it's a lot at every stage, and when you put it all together, it's a ridiculous lot. It's like a lot, a lot, a lot.

Nhi 20:08

Yeah, no, I think you're right, and also I think um most of the reporting is voluntary, so I don't know how much we can believe in the reporting that we do have access to, right? And because there aren't protocols, policies, or procedures that exist to standardize the collection of this data, it's really just a guessing game. Like, so for example, in 2024, Google um reported on themselves that they had like reached approximately 31 billion liters or 8.1 billion gallons for for you American peeps. Um in I'm also American, why am I even saying that? In 2024. Which is 28% increase from the previous year, right? Like, but 31 billion liters is such like an obscure amount to me. Like that, I can't even I don't even have know how to contextualize that, right? Like, is that a lot of water? Like how much should we, you know, a kosha, how much 31 billion liters of water is? Like, is that a city consumption or what?

CJ 21:19

That doesn't make sense. Like, that doesn't that doesn't sound like an amount of water we should ever have to worry about because it just exists in in in a place. It's just like, yeah, that water is there at 36 trillion. Yeah, we're good. Don't worry about it. Not we're we're messing with that water. We shouldn't be touching that water. That's too much water to be touching.

Nhi 21:38

Yeah, I and and I think like reporting on this again, like just as we're reading these stats, right? It makes zero sense to us. So, how can we know if we're supposed to be panicking or if it's supposed to be like deploying agency in our civic duty, right, to either stop or uh increase our literacy? Or whatever it is. So for example, New York City uses nearly one billion gallons of water per day. So in a year. Which is crazy. 31 billion. Okay, so one billion per gallon that's for people mostly. And then one billion uh 31 billion in a year just for technology, that's like you you don't drink that water. That doesn't it doesn't get recycled. That's that's crazy to me.

CJ 22:36

Well, it shouldn't be a problem because we're not water scarce at all. We're cool. We're totally fine. We've got we've got plenty water. We're good. We're good. We're good. Yeah, we're good. Don't worry about it. New York doesn't need that water. New York is totally fine.

Nhi 22:56

Yeah, yeah, we're fine. We're totally fine. Um what do you think, you know? I feel like regulation should play a role. Do you think what do you think the government or uh sort of policymakers uh role is in this? Because it's not like you know, you and I can be like, yo, what up Google? Like, stop. You see so much water on your data centers.

CJ 23:22

Oh well, it's it seems like the first thing that needs to happen is that level of transparency that we're talking about. If we're talking about this much water is being used at all times, a lot of these investigations are investigations. These are journalists having to pull these numbers, these are activists trying to get this information out. Rather than just transparent reporting to just, you know, exist. They just are continuously telling us this is what's actually happening. And that would actually maybe get us to a point where we're able to regulate this kind of thing, where we can start saying, hey, maybe we uh don't use that much water because that's ridiculous, especially when you compare it to all the other places that are also in need of water, that are also reporting on the water that they're using, because we have to regulate that. And like some of these things I know exist in some capacity already. Like the EU has the energy efficiency directive mandates, which require some monitoring of water and energy use, but that is still something that we're only talking about certain sizes and certain cases, and that's still a relatively new phenomenon, too. Being able to report on this information feels like something that needs to be enshrined in law, so we can start calling people out of, hey, knock it off. We should be able to regulate this the same way we're regulating other businesses, other water uses as well.

Nhi 24:40

That's true. I mean, um, although I think it in particular in the US is kind of weird because water is basically privatized. Um we will explore a little bit more later. But then, okay, so I agree with you that it definitely needs to be regulated, but or like reported on. But then, you know, it still feels like okay, let us just be transparent. We're but they're already consuming that water, so we're gonna be delayed by like a year or at the you know, at the very earliest, like a quarter if they do a quarterly reporting of the water they've already consumed and used. So are there any mechanisms you know, I'm just going back to our key questions here. Is you know, one of them is who decides where data centers are getting built in the first place, and especially if they're always plopped in places that are water scarce. How do we mitigate the root cause? Is it don't build data centers? Is it build data centers elsewhere? Is it build data centers differently? What do you think that that has to look like?

CJ 25:51

Oh.

Nhi 25:54

Hey yeah, girl, I'm asking all the hard questions today.

CJ 25:58

No, it's the hardest questions. I mean, the unfortunate answer is it's all of it, right? You know, we're talking about we are building massive data centers and we're building lots of new ones, but data centers have existed for a long time. And a lot of the time what we're talking about with a data center is, you know, your cell phone operates because of data centers. The internet operates because of data centers. And so there are, to some extent, there is an excuse that, hey, these do exist and they need to continue to exist. And we're using this technology is for good things, and they are helping you in your daily life. But at the same time, there are ways for us to focus on not building more and more massive data centers. I think that there is, we've hit this point of diminishing returns in a lot of ways, of continuing to build these massive data centers and trying to advance the technology. We've hit a point where a lot of the advancements that we're making, a lot of the additional power we would get, is not showing the same kind of returns that it did, you know, versions and versions ago. We're going to see similar models, we're going to see similar work being done with these larger, higher resource demand versions. So maybe there's a world what we're doing is trying to scale back. We're trying to make smaller data centers, we're trying to make smaller models, we're trying to make things that are going to be not as substantial in terms of the resource demand. That feels like an easy next step of like, why did it need to be this big anyways? What was the plan? But then there's also, it starts to feed into this purpose side of things. Not our purpose, their purpose. What is the purpose for building these new data centers? Is it going to be these are going to be used for doing research and working on models that are going to be used for climate technology or climate investigations or research? Or is this something that is going to be building the next LLM that a company can use to be able to lay off 300 of its workers? I think that there is a pretty big distinction between those two kinds of artificial intelligence and machine learning and uses of data centers.

Nhi 28:04

No, I think, yeah, that's super fair. And and right now, because the reporting is so obscure, you don't even know which really publicly which data centers or how much energy of a specific data center or the processing of one is related to what function and what applications of um the compute is being run on. Wait, did that even grammatically make sense? Yeah, you know what I mean. Yeah, okay, okay. So I there's also another way to this, which is what's happening in Uganda as well, right? Like on top of that, if we're talking about the global south, because everything's so concentrated um in the global north, is Uganda also has explicitly stated as their positioning that they don't want to use Western cloud providers, which means they're like partnering with like things like AfroCloud to build their own local infrastructure, which is what you were talking about, like local smaller data centers with smaller models. And then this begs the question of sovereignty. Data sovereignty, hardware sovereignty.

Cobalt, Extraction & the Global Supply Chain

Nhi 29:22

I think this might be a good segue to talk about minerals because there's a little bit of a bottleneck there between you know the processing of rare earth minerals that everybody needs, every country doesn't matter your you know political affiliation or whatever, or your preferences, you be needing these minerals. So how can we be ethical and you know, in a resource-constrained world when very few um countries or companies own the processing or the mining of these minerals?

CJ 30:04

Sovereignty is one of my favorite words. It's a very good word. It's a very important word. And especially when it comes to technologies and things like that. These there is so much of this, you know, the global north, the western hemisphere, they are very big into we are going to get all the resources that we need one way or another, and we will do it at whatever cost, and we will make things happen. And in that context of minerals, it is, you know, we're talking about all of these physical technologies. We're talking about batteries, EVs, wind turbines, obviously data centers and phones, and all of these things do contain a mineral of some sort. And a lot of the time these things are being extracted from other places because these things are not all present in, for example, in the US. We're not digging out lithium, nickel, copper, manganese, all these rare earth elements at the scale that we need to be to be able to produce all the things that we're looking for. So we start to export to other parts of the world. When we're talking about narrowing in on some of these minerals, one of the important minerals that we're talking about is cobalt. Cobalt is a very relevant mineral that we need for so many different technologies, and more than 70% of the world's cobalt comes from a singular country, from the Democratic Republic of Congo. The DRC also holds approximately 50% of the total known global cobalt reserves. That means that we are talking about one singular country that owns half of what every country needs to be able to develop these technologies. But Chinese companies control almost 70% of industrial cobalt mines, with the DRC approximately being 77 to 80% of that cobalt refining. Now that math doesn't math out in a way that is working out in the favor of the Democratic Republic of Congo. When we're talking about these forms of extraction, when we're talking about these kinds of industrial investment, it's usually not going to be in the favor of the host country. So why is it that the countries that are able to provide these kinds of resources, the land, the energy, the resources that are required to make these things happen, are not the ones that are getting to benefit from these things in the first place.

Nhi 32:17

Yeah, I'm just gonna peg that up to, you know, colonialism and imperialism. Right up in here. And that's totally fair, but you know, systemically, right now in this conversation, unfortunately, we can't like flip a switch and be like, Ayo, let's do reverse brain drain, reverse resource uh exploitation and labor exploitation, and basically put the power and the economic power back in the hands of the countries that actually should have owned um the full supply chain, or at least like large amounts of the supply chain for these rare earth minerals, right? So I think the what is really fucked up about this is it also creates a single like chokehold point in the supply chain. So let's say, and this is not about geopolitics, by the way. Let's just say um right. Oh, maybe it is about geopolitics. Fucking hell.

CJ 33:27

I was gonna say setting that aside and then bringing it back in a little bit. Let's talk about it.

Nhi 33:31

Well, I mean, listen, so geopolitic basically is accelerating a lot of the climate crises um consequences that we're living in right now. Right. Let's say the military-industrial complex is the most profitable it is uh thing that we could ever have. War is very profitable. What's going on with the USA, Israel, and Iran is constraining the world's supply of petroleum through the Strait of Hormuz. Right. And so the single choke point for Cobalt that you're talking about is very similar where if we're out of fuel, we can't actually trade. Or we're running low in fuel, you know, like fuel has to go towards uh essentials, right? Like electricity for housing, um, hospitals, uh, agriculture, even farmers are, you know, like riding um now or protesting because the the petroleum prices are so crazy and their margins already so thin. So think about the demand of all of this cloud compute power that we have. How is um yeah, having single chokehold points with basically zero you know international collaboration helpful for both environmental or or human um or sorry, planetary and and human rights?

CJ 35:02

It feels like we got zero wiggle room.

Nhi 35:05

Yeah, actually, I did not I did not feel like I should have put us down that for the panic party.

CJ 35:12

No, but that is that is the hole that we are in, and that is why the panic is justified. Is it does feel like there is zero zero wiggle room that we're talking about here? You know, if we're if one country is responsible for 70% of the world's cobalt, then what happens if they decide that they don't want to provide that anymore? What happens if there is a war that breaks this up? What happens if there is action from Western countries that says, hey, we're gonna go ahead and cut that off because China's the one that's making a lot of money off of this? What happens when global politics start to get into these things? Everybody needs to have their phones. We seem to have all agreed on that. That that is a priority for us. So we'll just keep making that happen.

Nhi 35:52

And I think I feel like yeah, sorry, go ahead.

CJ 35:55

No, you go ahead.

Speaker 2 35:57

I was just gonna I was just gonna caveat that um there's no way uh other economies are gonna try to cut China off because we're so in dire, desperate need of cobalt for everything that we do. It is impossible. So they hold all of the cards. And again, this is not about geopolitics, this is just economics, this is how this is what the supply chain is. Um and of course, you know, like geopolitics will play into it uh through through trade agreements and negotiations. But are there alternatives then um to mining kobolds in the DRC? We're gonna just swoop past you know the human rights stuff and all of that sort of things. Not that we don't swoop that. But that's we are. We're gonna be talking about it um in upcoming episodes.

CJ 36:45

Even if we're tossing all that out the window and we're saying, you know, we're not gonna worry about we're not gonna worry about human rights right now. We'll come back to that later. We're gonna focus on what other options do we have. One option is instead of mining on land, why don't we just go into the ocean? We just keep digging down deeper. What if we just, you know, forget the land? Who needs that? If we're focusing on deep sea mining, so you know, we're moving away from land-based extraction and we're focusing on the ocean. There are less environmental, economic, political limits when we're looking at the ocean, you know?

Nhi 37:19

Sorry. I'm listening to you.

CJ 37:24

No, that was just it was the most beautiful. It sounded like a river all of a sudden. And it was the perfect transition when I said ocean, and then suddenly there were ocean sounds.

Nhi 37:34

You think the mic caught i t? That would be so funny.

CJ 37:36

Oh, 100%. It was so crisp. It was so crisp. It was beautiful. Thank you for the ocean sound.

Nhi 37:43

Please continue.

CJ 37:44

Yes.

Nhi 37:45

My pleasure.

CJ 37:46

If we're talking about the ocean side of things, so we're moving beyond land and we're moving into a space where things get to be less economically and politically fraught, you know? We're talking about open ocean where people can kind of go do what you want. It's fine. Let's look specifically. There is the Clarion -Clipperton zone in the Pacific Ocean. And this has lots of deposits of minerals. We're talking about cobalt, but also nickel, copper, manganese. There are roughly one million square kilometers of exploratory contracts in this space. Which, again, that's a big number, once again, especially for the, you know, North American audience, sorry, the US audience, I suppose, kilometers. I don't know. But that's roughly the size of the country of Egypt. That is a metric we can all get behind. That's a lot. That's a lot of space. And, you know, we're talking about this massive space, and there is less of a concern about the extractive harm that is doing, that is occurring to the people that are in this place because it's the ocean. So there's not a lot of people living at the bottom of the ocean. There are, on the other hand, like there are other things that are living there. Maybe that's also important. Like the Kraken, like large, very cool crabs. But overall, we're talking about like, if we're looking at those species, we're talking about about 5,000 species that are new to scientists. So maybe that's a problem. Maybe that's, you know, maybe that's not great.

Nhi 39:19

But like, yeah, how would we re um bro in my rain? How would we rehabilitate is not the right word? Like if we were to go do the deep sea mining uh situation, yeah, you know, whatever. Send James Cameron down there with his film crew or whatever. We'd be digging, destroying the habitat. How would we actually reverse the environmental damage from that type of mining? Because the ocean obviously is part of our ecosystem, but also in terms of carbon capture, our biggest ally. Um, and uh so it's it's just kind of like this is viable. We don't do land, we do sea, but we're still destroying the planet in irreparable ways.

CJ 40:16

Maybe we're destroying things still. There is a lower greenhouse gas cost, but maybe we're destroying a few things. Maybe, maybe 940 scientists have uh called for a moratorium on deep sea mining for this exact reason, but who's to say? Who's to say? So this is also bad. It sounds like this is maybe not also the solution, but you know, what if we just stopped having phones?

Nhi 40:42

Well, that would be a cultural, I feel like, and a technological revolution, right? Because smartphones. Because I feel like there isn't really too much of a need. Well, of course, like e-banking and stuff like that is now on smartphones, QR codes, whatever, whatever. Um I was actually looking at Y2K phones because I was like, yeah, I'm gonna switch to like a flip phone, you know, this old like Motorola and stuff. Except um I can't function in society without my smartphone because I can't access anything. Like zero, nothing. My face has to be used, you know, biometrics. Um so I wonder with you know, the minerals argument, and maybe this is something for the experts who's watching this or in the comments to educate us about. Um we've developed and innovated like different things like concrete is pretty toxic in general, but we have hemp crete. Right. Is there an alternative to rare earth minerals like cobalt that can be created and manufactured? Now, maybe that's why plastics were created. I don't know. Is there an alternative? I don't know if there's one that I can think of off of the top of my head that we can manufacture in a lab.

CJ 42:09

But this is an interesting conundrum that we've run into because I mean now we're talking about could technology is causing us to use the planet. Could technology save us? Could it new inventions be the solution? We're touching on the Malthusian swerve again. We're going back. If we just keep digging a little deeper, if we just work a little harder, maybe we can figure it out.

Nhi 42:38

Yo, I cannot believe I played into that. Ah to be a human person.

Is Technology The Problem - Or The Way We Use It?

Nhi 42:41 Speaker 2 42:47 Speaker 2 42:47

Okay, so then is technology the problem versus technology our solution the right framing at all?

CJ 43:01

Is it that simple? I mean, we talked about, we set this framing as, you know, we're gonna be talking about resource demand in technology. And a lot of the time when we talk about technology, we're honing in on AI data centers and we're honing in on these things that we see as the big flashy technologies, but also what's technology? Straight up.

Nhi 43:27

Are you actually asking me to define technology?

CJ 43:29

Oh no, no, but there is is let me ask you this is a toothbrush technology?

Nhi 43:39

Yes.

CJ 43:42

Toothbrush is a technology, but also cell phones and data centers are technology. So if all of these things are falling into the same bucket, then they can be both the problem and the solution. Our ability to extract water to drink is technology. Technology, but our overuse of water is technology.

Nhi 44:08

Yes. Because okay, if you're gonna break it down, I guess technology is just the application of uh I don't know, like knowledge, right? Um could be scientific blah blah blah industrial scientific discoveries or whatever. So I guess in that broad term yes, technology is both the solution and the answer, but I guess in this context, when we're talking about machine learning, data, robotics for climate resilience, is that technology that end of the spectrum, which you know inherently doesn't take into account existent uh constraints because we're just like constantly innovating, innovating, innovating the the solution to all of our problems. So maybe we veer away from that and think about the framing in this way. It's not the technology that is gonna be the savior or detriment to humanity and planet, it's the application of that technology. So who owns it, who controls it, and who gets a say in building it or using it, I feel like should be the focus point.

CJ 45:35

I think that's exactly right. No, I think that's I think that's 100%. I think that we are lumping too many things into this term, and I think that is to our detriment. I think that it is very easy for for companies and governments and individuals to say technology is saving us, and for individuals and activists and communities to say technology is dooming us, and neither of those are correct because technology is so broad. But if we're being more specific, if we're breaking things down and we're actually saying, what do we mean by technology? And the application and the ownership, the purpose, if I will, behind technology is the thing that matters in this context, then suddenly we are able to divide these things out into the categories that are meaningful. Technology owned locally by a community, designed by a community, the purpose of which is driven by a community, is vastly different than the technology that is thrust upon us by a corporation who has decided that, congratulations, you as the water scarce town are now the home to Meta's largest data center.

Nhi 46:54

I think that's fair. I think that um, this is kind of like a question that bugs me because then it kind of loops back around, right? Like sovereignty, which is our favorite word. The balance between sovereignty and governance. Because for something to be sovereign, it doesn't have to be controlled or managed by the government. But governance is important because it could be grassroots, it could be community, it could be some sort of co-op system, right? So maybe we do a little bit of blue sky dreaming, or maybe you know, we kind of like talk through some examples of what um success might look like if we were to say, hey, we just oh shit, we didn't panic about land. That's fine. We can't always panic about land.

CJ 47:55

We will pack up panic about land another time, or energy and emissions, maybe four-ish. You know what? Next episode, land and energy.

Nhi 48:04

Thank you, CJ. All of the hard work. Um, but I think this is yeah, it's important to I don't know to segregate or just to really like just define, right? Like what is what needs to be sovereign and to whom, and then how is that going to be governed? And do we have any examples that maybe we can share in this conversation of things that are already brewing that could be um viable options for us moving forward as a collective?

CJ 48:40

Blue skying is so hard because I'm like, I know there's gonna be so many things that make these things impossible, but I'm gonna start thinking through what I believe that process can look like. It feels like one of those first steps is defining, you know, at a local community level, what is important to you and what is not. Saying no to the things that are unimportant, saying no to the things that you do not want, that are not going to benefit you, that do not facilitate sovereignty or local governance. I think an example of that is, you know, in the US, we're talking about what? In 2025, in a three-month period, there were 98 billion dollars of data centers that were canceled because of community resistance. And that is an example of people choosing together, that this is something that we do not want, that this was action at that community level where they're saying, hey, this thing is going to be created. Come and make comments about it. And the comments were, no, it's not. It's not gonna happen. And that level of government showing that being able to react to what people are asking for when they are saying that this does not benefit us clearly, that immediately brings together a lot of unlikely bedfellows. You know, you've got the local activists, but you've also got the NIMBY people who are often so antagonistic and causing so much harm to, you know, the increasing housing or accessibility, but at the same time, they are suddenly also deeply opposed to data centers. And this combination under this form of government that says, what is it that we need for us all to benefit? There is this one success story of people being able to resist technologies that are not bringing them what they need.

Nhi 50:37

Yeah, and right, and that doesn't serve um humanity or you know, like local communities in any way and does more harm than good. So I guess like in that sense, when you're talking about sovereignty, that's like sovereign to the community. Um, like that's ownership over their land, that's ownership over their immediate local resources, right? So then as governments who are supposed to govern, supposed to govern. Allegedly, um, maybe a pathway is to have to facilitate, right? Like to end all NDAs between the data center developers and local governments, just like Microsoft has voluntarily done this because of the blowback, um, and then in state legislation banning it um continually, like Wisconsin has proposed. And I wonder if um beyond this, if mandatory standardized disclosures should just come first anyway, like preemptively, you know, not just be like, oh, we're just gonna volunteer to like sign these NDAs or disclose that you know we're planning on developing, you know, in this territory. But say, hey, if you have anything to do with the encroachment of um depleting natural resources in this localized region, you actually have to disclose your plans.

CJ 52:16

What a concept. What a concept. Of just you have to share. You have to tell us if you're going to do things that are going to be harmful to us. That feels like such a low bar, but also a legal hurdle to overcome. But we're blue skying. We're really blue skying.

Nhi 52:35

Well, the thing is, you already talked about this, right? You mentioned the EU Energy Efficiency Directive, which is like, I guess, is like the closest model um to this. However, you know, applying it everywhere all over the world uh is a different matter, but it's something. And I think it's important that um we increase our literacy as individuals, as organizers, um, as human beings, so that we're informed. Um to have, you know, so that we we can feel hope and take action. Because I think without this literacy, you're just gonna like spin in circles saying, hey, you know, there's I can't do shit. You know, you can't make something less harmful if you don't educate yourself about it.

CJ 53:25

I think that that's one of the biggest things that as an individual you can do. And I think especially at a time where the things that companies are trying to get us to do is to be less educated on these things, to take away our personal sovereignty over the technologies that we are using. You know, we used to live at a time, wow, I sound like a real boomer thing to say, but um I stand by it. We used to live at a time where technologies could be repaired. You know, you could pop open your radio and you could put it back together if you had to. And that ability has been lost in a lot of ways, and reclaiming it is a form of resistance to these kinds of extraction, of teaching yourself what is a data center actually, what is the cloud, and choosing intentionally to work with companies that you believe hold your values, that are trying harder to work towards sustainable solutions or that are doing the right thing in some capacity or another. In that way, you're choosing with your dollars, but you're also choosing technology that feels most closely aligned with your own values. I think that there is a world where you can host your own cloud services, even if you're able to get a hold of an old computer from a thrift store. That is enough to be able to store all of your images and things like that directly on that laptop through three YouTube videos. About an hour of work, you could probably put that up. And that is a way to begin resisting and educating yourself as well.

Nhi 54:57

That's true. I mean, I guess every not everyone is gonna have the resources or the disposable time to do this. I feel like it's definitely a privilege, especially if like RAM prices keep going up as so fucking expensive right now. Um thank you, Sam Altman. And um, but I think as an individual who might work in a larger group or in like an organization, you could definitely rally for ethical selection of vendors. Um, and if you can, and if relevant, also have locally you know hosted um compute power um and resources there. I also kind of want to caveat though, like as an individual, sometimes I get I feel ashamed of like AI, my own like AI use, right? So obviously, you know, we're not using AI for like, oh, how many sewing pools are there around me? I mean, that's just like a web search.

CJ 56:06

A classic AI search.

Nhi 56:08

A classic AI search. Um and uh but your usage of like GPT or like any of these chatbots as an individual, just like recycling as an individual household, is really negligible. Um, it's really organizations and governments and militaries that are using uh this technology the most in the most harmful ways. So I would encourage everyone to maybe focus less and feel less guilt if you can on your own use, if you have to use it for work, for example, or if you need it um to make services more accessible to you, um, health-wise, or um, you know, I know a lot of people use it to like look up, hey, like, you know, what are my options for um healthcare in my region, especially if I don't have insurance, that can save you a lot of time and money, etc. But ask yourselves um how can you pay more attention to like local planning decisions because those meetings are public? You should go to those and see how it impacts um your community, your households. Um, support, you know, like independent journalism and research that investigates the harm or the benefits of alternative types of technology, um, etc. So, you know, we want you to feel hope, but in a very critical and organized manner so that you can act on it.

CJ 57:44

Sometimes it's just showing the way that you care. It is even if you are unable to avoid these kinds of things, being able to voice to other people that you're concerned about these. If your company has decided that AI is the new frontier for what you're working on, being willing to ask questions about do we know anything about the energy use or the water use that is going on with these providers that we're talking to, being able to just show that these are things that you're interested in is often enough to start these conversations, to start systemic change. That's the best place to begin.

Nhi 58:18

Literacy is really the answer. So if you like, you know, educate yourself and learn, um, that's the one thing no government, no corporation, no billionaires, no systemic issue can take away from you. And that is your power. That is your number one power is to be an informed individual. Um that that was good. Um right, so I think it's a great time for maybe us to wrap with some of the pending questions, right? Like that we didn't really answer, that we'll probably discuss in the upcoming episodes, like who bears the cost of extraction, uh, which is something that we were stuck on when we were talking about Cobalt and the DRC. And um the other question that we didn't exactly tackle is is AI in particular, not just technology. Um is the AI will solve it argument? It will solve everything the answer, or is it just a deflection uh from or justification, I guess, for us to continue building um these sort of technologies and the hardware that comes with that um technology? Is it the answer to everything? I don't know.

CJ 59:39

I feel a series coming on. So we've got more questions to talk about. We've got questions we still need to answer. It feels to me like there might be another episode on this topic.

Nhi 59:50

Just one, or maybe three.

CJ 59:53

Maybe more. Maybe that's the whole podcast. Maybe this is what we're doing.

Nhi 59:58

But for now, thank you so much for tuning in. Um, if you have any questions, uh feedback, or things that you wanted to discuss, we'd love to hear from you. Um, just leave your thoughts in the comments below the video, or if you're listening to this on an audio platform like Apple or Spotify, then you can fill out the form on our website and we'll get back to you as soon as we can.

CJ 1:00:24

We love your comments, we love your questions, we are not experts, we are just pals panicking together and trying to find our solutions. So we love to hear from you.

Nhi 1:00:34

Thanks for listening.

CJ 1:00:37

Catch you next time.