Top tech investor Gavin Baker regrets his comments on data centres; says what I should have said is: There are reasonable concerns and ...

Top tech investor Gavin Baker has publicly expressed regret over his earlier remakes dismissing opposition to data centers. In a post last week, Baker had written that ‘any politician opposed to data centers is unqualified to hold public office’, calling them a godsend for blue-collar workers and small towns. However, now Baker struck a a different tone, saying he regretted the phrasing and acknowledged that there were “reasonable concerns” about data centers around 18 months ago.Gavin Baker’s original post on data centersBaker's earlier post declared that "nature is healing" on the data center debate, going as far as saying any politician opposed to data centers was unqualified to hold public office. In that post, he argued data centers were revitalizing small towns across America, delivering major benefits to blue-collar workers, lowering electricity costs, accelerating the shift to sustainable energy, and using only negligible amounts of water.The walkbackIn a follow-up post, Baker said he regretted the tone of his prior comments, offering a more measured version of his argument instead. He acknowledged that concerns about data centers were reasonable roughly 18 months ago, spanning issues like water usage, taxes, job creation, electricity prices, environmental impact, and effects on small towns. His revised position is that well-structured data center projects have since largely addressed those concerns, and that the industry's overall record now deserves to be seen as a positive for the country.Addressing key issuesBaker outlined how well-structured projects have since addressed worries over water usage, taxes, jobs, electricity prices, and environmental impact:•Water: U.S. data centers use far less water than golf courses, with newer facilities adopting closed-loop or recycled systems.•Taxes: While sales-tax exemptions drew criticism, Baker noted that property taxes from data centers have become a major revenue source in counties like Loudoun, VA and Quincy, WA.•Jobs: Demand for electricians, plumbers, welders, and HVAC technicians has surged, with unions now backing data center projects.•Power: Ratepayer-protection deals and large-load tariffs ensure households aren’t burdened by higher electricity costs. In some states, utilities have cut or frozen residential rates due to data center investments.•Environment: Facilities increasingly rely on natural gas, solar, and batteries, with commitments to carbon neutrality. Batteries also support grid stability, as seen in Texas.Impact on small townsBaker highlighted the transformation of towns like Quincy, WA, where poverty fell from 29% to 6% and tax revenues funded schools, hospitals, and libraries. He argued that data centers are “reindustrializing parts of America” and creating durable working-class jobs.A revised stanceConcluding his post, Baker said: “When the facts change, I change my mind. I hope that reasonable people who had good faith reasons to oppose data centers at least consider updating their beliefs given the change in the facts over the last 18 months.” He added that future projects should also focus on aesthetics, suggesting data centers be designed as beautifully as Grand Central Station.Read Gavin Baker’s complete post hereRegret the tone of my post on data centers yesterday.What I should have said:There were reasonable concerns about data centers 18ish months ago: water, taxes, jobs, electricity prices, the environment and what they would do to small towns. Well-structured data center projects have largely addressed these concerns today and we should be celebrating this. On balance, data centers are awesome for America in every way.On water: U.S. data centers use a fraction of what golf courses use. A lot of the numbers from 18 months ago were off by over 1000x. Newer data centers use closed-loop systems or recycled water. Should be required by every town approving a data center project.On taxes: looking only at sales-tax exemptions, as Ronan Farrow did, is the wrong way to evaluate this. Data centers pay significant property taxes. Loudoun County, which is the wealthiest county in America, now collects on the order of $1 billion a year from data centers. In Quincy, WA, data centers are more than half the property-tax roll. Over time, property taxes can go to zero while government spending increases in these towns.On jobs: this has been unambiguously awesome for blue collar Americans. Demand for electricians, plumbers, welders, HVAC techs, and contractors has gone vertical, and it is not a one-time construction job. These buildings get upgraded and expanded over time. That is why the building trades are fighting for them, and why some unions are now treating opposition to data centers as a reason not to endorse politicians.On power: the original fear was that households would pay for the incremental electricity demand in the form of higher prices. That is why the ratepayer-protection deals and the new large-load tariffs exist. The right structure is: the data center brings or pays for new generation and signs a contract long enough that existing customers are protected. Where that is happening, utilities are cutting or freezing residential rates and saying so on the record. Where it is not, people are right to object. Electricity prices are going down *today* in a number of large states because of data centers. On the environment: data centers overwhelming use natural gas today, which is the cleanest power source outside of nuclear, solar and wind. And the companies that are building the data centers are committed to carbon neutrality such that an equivalent amount of solar will likely be built. Maybe more importantly, the data centers need batteries to function effectively and these batteries can also sell energy back into the grid (which recently prevented blackouts in Texas). Over time, data centers will run on solar plus batteries.On the towns: Poverty in Quincy, WA fell from 29% to 6%. Data center taxes paid for a new high school, a hospital, a library, police and fire stations. This is happening in many left for dead former mill and farm towns that had no other bidder for the land.Data centers are actually reindustrializing parts of America and creating the kind of working-class jobs both parties have spent decades claiming to support. That should not be a partisan issue. Data centers can and should be awesome for America and they increasingly, overwhelmingly are. Supporting the outsourcing of data centers to China will likely age just as well as support for the outsourcing of high quality, blue collar manufacturing jobs to China has aged.When the facts change, I change my mind. I hope that reasonable people who had good faith reasons to oppose data centers at least consider updating their beliefs given the change in the facts over the last 18 months. This really matters for America.I will say I also think the idea of making data centers beautiful is a good one that has yet to be implemented. Data centers should be just as beautiful as Grand Central Station. We can learn a lot from the railroad buildout. Neoclassical revival ftw.Might write up open-weight AI tomorrow as this is equally essential to America.Get the latest technology news and updates. Download the TOI App.