en.Wedoany.com Reported - Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella announced at the Build conference that the company is adopting a new closed-loop cooling system, enabling data centers to operate with "zero water consumption." Nadella noted that the cooling loop requires only a one-time water fill, and the daily water usage of a data center throughout the year is roughly equivalent to that of a restaurant.

Previous research has predicted that by 2030, the annual water consumption of artificial intelligence data centers could rival that of Africa's 1.3 billion population. However, some tech CEOs, including OpenAI's Sam Altman and Microsoft's Nadella, have dismissed such claims.

According to Tom's Hardware, traditional data centers mostly rely on evaporative cooling systems to prevent server overheating, which requires a continuous supply of fresh water. In contrast, Microsoft's new system is filled with water once during the construction phase and then circulates heat between servers and chillers without needing additional replenishment. The company stated in late 2024 that this approach could save 125 million liters of water per data center annually.

The new system is currently implemented only in Microsoft's newer data centers, and its actual benefits remain to be seen. The company operates hundreds of data centers worldwide. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman also said earlier this year that concerns about unsustainable water consumption due to AI training are "completely false," citing the energy required to raise a human as a comparative reference.

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