Nashville community members, Fisk alumni, and current students are protesting the university’s plan to build a local data center. So far, an online petition has generated 6,000 signatures and community members are calling on the university to halt its plan for a data center that some worry could impede the health and well-being of the surrounding neighborhoods.
Experts says a data center’s strain on a community’s water and energy systems, including increased pollution, could negatively impact residents in areas where data centers are located. University administrators want the center for student technology advancement and education.
Data centers have been constructed in the past to support for cloud storage infrastructure, but environmental justice advocates say the increased number of centers needed to appease the rapid growth of artificial intelligence will likely have adverse effects on the environment and quality of life of residents and wildlife in surrounding communities.
The realization of the damage that data centers can do to the environment — decreased air quality, massive water and electricity consumption, habitat destruction — has raised questions as to why Fisk has considered building close to the university that houses more than 1,000 students.
Community members are also currently fighting against plans to build a data center near the Nashville Zoo, citing the effects it could have on water quality available to sustain the animals; already reports show a water infrastructure that is "impaired for siltation and habitat alteration," which is evidence the system is degrading, experts say. Protesters say the same concerns exist around the quality of water in and around Nashville's Black community.
Fisk alumnus and professor, and state Representative Justin Jones said, “If it’s not good for a zoo, it’s not good for an HBCU.” In an ongoing EDU Ledger LinkedIn poll, 66 percent of voters say they do not believe HBCUs should allow data centers to be built on campus.
The largest data center in Tennessee belongs to Tesla creator and CEO, Elon Musk, standing at one million square feet in Memphis, Tennessee. His purchase of the land and building left communities infuriated as they manage the environmental and health fallouts of pollution from the center's gas turbines and water plants.
This is a fight that will, more than likely, go on for decades as the battle between progress and the ethics of emerging technologies, including artificial intelligence, grows. As the world moves forward, incorporating AI in so many aspects of our lives, questions abound over where the energy comes from, who pays the ultimate price, and who benefits from the deterioration of communities and those who live in them.
