One data centre in South Africa will use more power than Kimberley or Nelspruit

konfab said:
I curse you with 3000ms latency to every single internet service you use.
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I work all day in remote datacenters, most of them not even on the same continent.

My last customer I had to connect to a VDI in one country to remote into another environment in another country.
Most of the time I wouldn't even notice that I wasn't using my local desktop.
The location is irrelevant, if we need new datacentres then they can build them the other side of Atlantis, the land will be cheaper, the power will be closer and no one will even know its there.
 
Nerfherder said:
They are claiming its closed loop cooling now.
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Even if it is it still will take enormous amounts of water to cool the electricity generation needed to power the thing. Which is never taken into account. Unless these things are 100% powered by renewables like wind and solar from day one having the center itself be closed loop (if we even believe them) means little.

It just transfers the burden further down the chain of supply and that transfer is directly onto us as the rest of society.

I can understand the necessity of a data center but they should be made 100% responsible for all costs and consequences. They shouldn't get a single tax break at all either.
 
bwana said:
By 2035? How about making it from day one.
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Hah, I saw a post where some US state said they were going to force data centers to start paying for their own electricity, and everyone went wait what?
 
AlmightyBender said:
Even if it is it still will take enormous amounts of water to cool the electricity generation needed to power the thing. Which is never taken into account. Unless these things are 100% powered by renewables like wind and solar from day one having the center itself be closed loop (if we even believe them) means little.
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True, there was an article the other day mentioning that they haven't even said what their backup generation will be.

All of this sounds like a corrupt mess.
AlmightyBender said:
It just transfers the burden further down the chain of supply and that transfer is directly onto us as the rest of society.

I can understand the necessity of a data center but they should be made 100% responsible for all costs and consequences. They shouldn't get a single tax break at all either.
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and it doesn't make sense that we have shut down the smelters (lots of jobs and GDP) for AI Datacenters (low jobs and GDP)
 
AlmightyBender said:
Even if it is it still will take enormous amounts of water to cool the electricity generation needed to power the thing. Which is never taken into account. Unless these things are 100% powered by renewables like wind and solar from day one having the center itself be closed loop (if we even believe them) means little.

It just transfers the burden further down the chain of supply and that transfer is directly onto us as the rest of society.

I can understand the necessity of a data center but they should be made 100% responsible for all costs and consequences. They shouldn't get a single tax break at all either.
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Both Medupi and Kusile are dry cooled power stations, as well as few other stations like Komati.

The other stations that are water cooled sit near sites of plentiful water in rural areas. Water that has already been allocated for them when they were built, and they are not using municipal water either as it is too expensive. Do you really think power stations are using municipal water? The water has already been allocated to the coal power stations.

Koeberg for example, uses sea water.

You need to stop it with the degrowth mindset. These data centers are very good for the economy, and right now Eskom needs customers for its electricity because of people like me telling them to f__koff
 

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Nerfherder said:
True, there was an article the other day mentioning that they haven't even said what their backup generation will be.

All of this sounds like a corrupt mess.

and it doesn't make sense that we have shut down the smelters (lots of jobs and GDP) for AI Datacenters (low jobs and GDP)
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Who is "we"?

Smelters need electricity to be at 63c per kwh so they can just start being competitive with China. And that is a special deal that forces everyone else to subsidise them. Legal corruption.

The Ai data centers are profitable with normal bulk rates from municipalities or Eskom. No special treatment. No deals. No subsidies.

Just to put this into comparison, if you look at the market cap of all of China's biggest steel companies:
1787832669097.png
Cumulative value is roughly $70B
bullfincher.io

Largest Steel Companies in China by Market Cap

This ranking features the list of the largest Steel companies in China ranked by Market Cap.
bullfincher.io bullfincher.io

For Ferrochrome, where Eskom has just concluded a deal, the entire market cap is roughly $20B
The global ferrochrome market size was valued at USD 20.9 billion in 2025 and is projected to grow from USD 22.2 billion in 2026 to USD 33.6 billion by 2033, at a CAGR of 6.1% from 2026 to 2033. The market in Asia Pacific dominated with a revenue share of 62.4% in 2025. The market growth is primarily driven by the rising demand for stainless steel across construction, automotive, and industrial manufacturing sectors, where ferrochrome serves as a critical alloying element for enhancing corrosion resistance and durability
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Space's market cap alone is $1.9T

Anthropic is targeting $2T
OpenAI is targeting $1T

But here you are saying it is a corrupt mess because people are investing in data centres over smelters.

So which one do you think will get a better return for investors?
 
konfab said:
Who is "we"?

Smelters need electricity to be at 63c per kwh so they can just start being competitive with China. And that is a special deal that forces everyone else to subsidise them. Legal corruption.
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and all those jobs ?

It was a good deal while we had electricity.


konfab said:
The Ai data centers are profitable with normal bulk rates from municipalities or Eskom. No special treatment. No deals. No subsidies.

Just to put this into comparison, if you look at the market cap of all of China's biggest steel companies:
View attachment 1932663
Cumulative value is roughly $70B
bullfincher.io

Largest Steel Companies in China by Market Cap

This ranking features the list of the largest Steel companies in China ranked by Market Cap.
bullfincher.io bullfincher.io

For Ferrochrome, where Eskom has just concluded a deal, the entire market cap is roughly $20B



Space's market cap alone is $1.9T

Anthropic is targeting $2T
OpenAI is targeting $1T

But here you are saying it is a corrupt mess because people are investing in data centres over smelters.

So which one do you think will get a better return for investors?
Click to expand...

AI is the most hyped vapid tech we have come up with so far. I think that stock is junk already.

If I'm wrong then we are all out of work anyway so either way I think its foolish to pick this option.
 
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I wonder about this: Nuclear power plants, despite their imposing appearance, boast an incredibly low infrastructure footprint per MWh over their 80-year lifespan due to continuous power production. In contrast, while individual renewable energy sources appear minimal, scaling them up to grid-scale Gigawatts demands a significantly heavier infrastructure footprint on Earth's raw materials due to the sheer repetition of foundations, towers, and cabling.
 
Can someone please explain what would happen is Terraco was wiped off the map?

Surely the services that they provide would be considered critical infrastructure and thus have super security etc?
 
Something doesn't make sense - where is the breakdown for the rest of the electricity consumption?

What is Eskom's current capacity?
What was it's capacity growth over the last 10-20 years to keep up with all this growth?
 
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