In a cheeky advertising and marketing marketing campaign, Liquid Demise teamed up with former Philadelphia Eagles star Jason Kelce to share an answer to mitigate the environmental impression of AI information facilities, which require huge portions of water to stop servers from overheating.
“AI information facilities waste thousands and thousands of gallons of water,” Kelce quips within the video marketing campaign. “That’s why Liquid Demise and Storage Beer have teamed up. We would like your pee to chill these information facilities.”
Then, as a crowd of individuals stroll by a subject sipping their branded drinks, they sing in unison: “Let’s pee on computer systems collectively to save lots of humanity!”
It’s a humorous industrial. What’s even funnier is that Kelce has unwittingly stumbled upon an actual tactic for cooling down information facilities.
“The Liquid Demise industrial is humorous and tongue-in-cheek,” Michael Obradovitch, vice chairman of Information Middle International Accounts at Ecolab, instructed TechCrunch. “However in actuality, there’s a honest quantity of different water sources already getting used to an analogous extent to chill these information facilities.”
These various water sources, when utilized in information facilities, no less than partially offset the demand for potable ingesting water. One such various water supply is recycled water, which is made by treating wastewater and sewage water in order that they’re secure to make use of once more. Wastewater and sewage water include many issues, together with — you guessed it! — human urine.
“You wouldn’t simply use pee, however you’ll be able to clear it and make it into helpful water, and that’s what we advocate,” Bruno Pigott, govt director of the WateReuse Affiliation and former appearing assistant administrator in water for the U.S. Environmental Safety Company (EPA), instructed TechCrunch.
To be clear: You shouldn’t really contribute gallons of your pee to assist cool information facilities, as Kelce facetiously suggests. However only for the sake of the thought experiment: What would occur if you happen to did attempt to cool a knowledge middle with a gradual stream of pee?
“Pee incorporates all types of stuff. It incorporates salts, it incorporates urea, micro organism, natural matter of all types that may depart mineral deposits. If you happen to simply put that right into a cooling tower or one thing else, it could require fixed cleansing,” stated Pigott. “One of many strategies of cooling is known as evaporative cooling, the place sizzling air is handed by water to take away warmth by evaporation. Are you able to think about if you happen to simply poured urine by sizzling air?”
We do have the expertise to show our urine into potable ingesting water — that’s what astronauts do in house, since they’ll solely convey a lot water with them on their spacecraft. However that isn’t environment friendly at a big scale, and even when it have been, it’s not like scientists can simply entry thousands and thousands of gallons of pee at will (nicely, not until Kelce actually commits to the bit). As an alternative, our rest room water results in wastewater and sewage.
That’s the place water remedy amenities are available in, offering recycled water to spare us from the scent of evaporated urine. These amenities use membrane bioreactors, reverse osmosis, ultraviolet mild, and different processes to deal with water till it’s clear sufficient for industrial use. In some instances, this water may even be handled to the purpose that it’s drinkable.
“We use recycled water for cooling for every kind of industries, and we now have for many years,” Dr. Greta Zornes, apply chief for water reuse on the engineering agency CDM Smith, instructed TechCrunch. “So this is just one software, however positively, there’s been a increase in recycled water for information middle cooling.”
Although Zornes has labored on water reuse expertise for greater than 20 years, her day-to-day work has shifted with the rising demand for information facilities.
“Each day proper now, I’m engaged on recycled water for information facilities,” she stated.
When information facilities use extra recycled water, they don’t pose as a lot of a burden to the native potable water provide. However industries can solely pivot to recycled water use when there’s correct infrastructure in place to deal with thousands and thousands of gallons of water each day.
“It’s important to be considerably close to a waste water remedy facility that’s sizable sufficient that you’ve got sufficient water to make use of,” Zornes stated. “So when information facilities exit into rural areas, quite a lot of instances the wastewater remedy vegetation simply aren’t sufficiently big — they’re not treating sufficient water for them to have the ability to take it and deal with it and use it.”
Loudoun County, Virginia, situated exterior of Washington, D.C., is dwelling to greater than 250 information facilities, with plans to assemble no less than one other two dozen. As of 2025, Loudoun information facilities collectively used about 200 million gallons of recycled water every day, however the water footprint of those information facilities is so excessive that this solely accounts for 43% of each day information middle water utilization within the space. The opposite 260 million gallons, or 57% of each day information middle water utilization, come from potable water provides, based on Loudoun Water.
“There’s quite a lot of infrastructure that needs to be constructed out and normally isn’t present at present, and that takes time,” Zornes stated. “That’s one of many issues — it’s simply the time that it takes to get that achieved.”
Obradovitch thinks that the AI trade may even drive sources towards constructing out this type of infrastructure to scale water remedy. Meta, for instance, will make investments no less than $270 million in wastewater infrastructure initiatives close to its information facilities (the corporate additionally loses about $4 billion every quarter on its Actuality Labs division).
“That’s the place information facilities can really are available in and be anchors of water infrastructure,” Obradovitch stated. “There’s a variety of instances and examples the place information facilities, as a part of their engagement with communities, have dedicated funding and capital to a few of these municipalities to assist in addressing a few of these actual challenges.”
On the coverage aspect, Pigott is advocating for laws that would offer a 30% tax credit score to assist industries scale their recycled water infrastructure.
“We predict it could drastically speed up the tempo with which information facilities and different industries entered into this space,” he stated.
Whereas there’s some unintentional science behind Liquid Demise’s joke, the industrial and its virality function a reminder to the tech trade that the environmental calls for of information facilities have develop into a mainstream concern. Based on a latest Gallup ballot, about seven out of 10 Individuals oppose information facilities of their communities, and AI merchandise proceed to face backlash from customers who really feel as if the expertise is being pressured into their lives.
“I’m glad that persons are involved about water, and something that raises consciousness of water, nevertheless crude it could be, may really be helpful,” Pigott stated. “It provides us an opportunity to teach the general public about what we’re doing at present.”
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