Health Consequences of Large Data Centers: Air Pollution, Noise, Water Use, and Environmental Justice

Babu George

No cnwyb_v1, SocArXiv from Center for Open Science

Abstract: The global expansion of large, energy-intensive data centers, accelerated by cloud computing, cryptocurrency, and artificial intelligence (AI), has created growing concern about implications for human health. Emerging scholarship highlights multiple health-relevant pathways: increased emissions of criteria air pollutants from power plants and onsite diesel backup generators, chronic environmental noise from cooling infrastructure, intensive water withdrawals that strain public supplies, and land-use changes that intersect with social determinants of health. Direct epidemiologic evidence on communities living near data centers remains sparse, with most work to date relying on lifecycle emissions modeling and indirect analogy with established air and noise pollution literatures. Nevertheless, modeling studies consistently project that by the late 2020s, U.S. data centers could be responsible for roughly 1,300 premature deaths and up to 600,000 asthma symptom cases annually, with an associated public health burden approaching $20 billion per year. Case studies reviewed document risks related to air pollution, water stress, and noise that fall disproportionately on vulnerable communities, with per-household health cost burdens estimated to reach multiple times the national average in some disadvantaged counties. Drawing on environmental health, noise science, water security, and environmental justice literatures, this article synthesizes current evidence, proposes a conceptual framework organizing four principal exposure pathways, identifies critical research gaps, and outlines policy and planning priorities to ensure that digital infrastructure development is compatible with public health protection and equity.

Date: 2026-03-06
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ene, nep-env and nep-hea
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:osf:socarx:cnwyb_v1

DOI: 10.31219/osf.io/cnwyb_v1

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