Data Center Expansion and its Effects on Local Health and Pollution

Abstract

Over the past decade, data centers have become infrastructural linchpins of society. They enable Internet activity, and are especially important for current development of artificial intelligence. They also use large quantities or local water supplies for cooling purposes and emit air pollution through on-site power generation. The local health effects of data center expansion are not yet fully understood nor examined. This study uses county-level data to explore the effects of data centers on local health and two mechanisms of poor health – water and air pollution. Three forms of difference-in-difference estimation is conducted at both a national and urban level. This work adds to a small but developing field of research, and contributes empirical analysis to the limited body of existing literature. While no significant treatment effects on health are established, a link between data center presence and increased local air pollution is revealed, suggesting that data centers significantly increase the level of fine particulate matter air pollution in urban counties. Due to data limitations and temporal constraints, data centers’ true effect on health may not yet be measurable. However, since air pollution is a known mechanism of poor health, data centers’ potential negative effects on local health may manifest in future years.