Externalities - part the fourth

Once again, into the breech. Those damn externalities, which demand to be paid for. But by whom? There is a little known, outside of those moving into new housing developments in certain (approaching most) jurisdictions, war between the existing housing and new housing. Here is one report. While some will call it simply NIMBY, others, humble self included, say it's merely the proper way to fix externalities.

Turns out, the issue isn't limited to McManisions on Easy Street (gated, of course). It's been reported off and on since the bitcoin debacle, that some forms of compute tax the electric grid. And, some times, create noxious noise pollution. Here's a new report on the impact.

The report by Wood MacKenzie, an energy research firm, examined 20 large power users. In almost all of those cases, the firm found, the money that large energy users paid to electric utilities would not be enough to cover the cost of the equipment needed to serve them. The rest of the costs would be borne by other utility customers or the utility itself.

Growth extortion might be new coinage. But the employment associated with such data centers is nearly invisible; what's the benefit to the community?

But as Stephan Bisaha of the Gulf States Newsroom reports, data centers themselves create few permanent jobs.
...
In fact, when Apple created a $1 billion data center in North Carolina, the news stories reported that there were less than hundred permanent jobs created as a result.

That source of news is soon to disappear. Such reporting is Anti-American, doncha know?

The utilities "either need to socialize the cost to other ratepayers or absorb that cost — essentially, their shareholders would take the hit," said Ben Hertz-Shargel, who is the global head of grid edge research for Wood MacKenzie.

There's an olde saying in bidnezz: you buy a lot, you pay less per unit. It's why Wally World so easily runs local and regional retailers out of bidnezz. The Evangelical Reactionary Radical Retrograde Right Wingnuts are always, but always, on the side of big bidnezz. It will be tres interesting to see how they respond to Wally World's stated intent to raise prices in lock-step with Trump Tariffs. Will we earn a Trumpcession or Trumppression? Only The Shadow knows.