Myers Explains Data Centers’ Impact in Florida

The feature highlights the growing debate in Central Florida over the rapid expansion of hyperscale data centers needed to support artificial intelligence. While these facilities power everyday digital services—from streaming content to processing transactions—their heavy energy and water demands have raised significant concerns among residents and local officials in communities like Eatonville and Orange County.

Data centers in Florida are classified as large facilities when they hit a peak load of 50 megawatts. Because one megawatt can power up to 1,000 homes, neighbors fear that intense demand will strain the power grid and drive up residential utility bills. Some operators and experts suggest using on-site power generation, solar energy, and battery storage to offset grid impact and even support local power supplies during emergencies.

Beyond electricity, water usage presents another major hurdle. Large data centers rely on water for cooling, raising concerns about local access and supply. Modern facilities are shifting toward closed-loop cooling systems that recirculate water, which conserves supply but requires significantly more energy to operate mechanically.

Job creation remains another point of contention. While construction provides temporary work and some facilities employ research and development staff, data centers generate few permanent local jobs compared to other industrial facilities.

"An Amazon warehouse might be a good comparison. Those employ many hundreds of people from a local community," said Myers. "A data center is not gonna do that. It’s going to be a small number of permanent employees focused on operations."

However, municipalities often weigh these minimal staffing levels against the significant local tax revenues data centers generate. "Data centers can be very good at generating tax revenue," Myers noted.

Addressing water consumption, Myers explained that a large facility uses a million gallons a day or more, contrasting its continuous demand with seasonal agricultural use. "Older data centers use evaporative cooling," Myers said, explaining that evaporated water cycles into the atmosphere rather than returning directly to local sources.

Ultimately, Myers suggested looking at the broader picture. "So think about transportation logistics, shipping. If you could make all shipping 1% more efficient, the environmental impact of that would far dwarf any data center project," Myers said. "On the other hand, maybe AI actually incentivizes us to do even more shipping than we were previously doing. In that case, it might even go the other way."

Watch the full video here.