this post was submitted on 13 Sep 2025
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Futurology

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Data centers aren't the sole cause of Ireland's high electricity prices, but they do contribute to them. The biggest cause is Ireland's reliance on imported natural gas.

That said, data centers are heading for 30% of the country's electricity use, and they contribute significantly to high prices. Effectively a subsidy from Irish consumers to Big Tech. There are other externalized costs, too. E.g. Supporting Big Tech data center infrastructure is delaying house building. Ireland is lucky in that most of Big Tech pays its European taxes to the Irish government, so there's a quid pro quo here. But that is less true for other parts of the world.

Some people think AI may need as big a share of other countries' electricity - who should be paying for this?

Government warned of rising household bills as data centres strain grid

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[–] etherphon@midwest.social 14 points 7 hours ago (1 children)

Big tech does not need fucking subsidies, they should be paying a premium for power, and there should be fucking ads in it.

[–] sunzu2@thebrainbin.org 3 points 5 hours ago

I don't think you understand how this system works.

They exploit us as consumers, and then they use government to transfer money from our incomes to fund their capex.

Idiots still cosplayong free market capitalism in earnest

[–] bufalo1973@piefed.social 6 points 8 hours ago

The fastest solution: if you build a DC that need X MW you have to build also a renewable power station that gives more than X MW.

[–] reddig33@lemmy.world 8 points 8 hours ago (2 children)

Is Ireland selling its electricity to the data centers at a discount?🤔

[–] bobs_monkey@lemmy.zip 1 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

Likely at bulk wholesale rates. So yes, at a discount compared to what the average consumer or business pays.

[–] reddig33@lemmy.world 1 points 39 minutes ago (1 children)

If there’s not enough electricity to go around, perhaps they shouldn’t do that.

In the states, it’s common for consumers to pay on a sliding scale — the rate increases every X number of kWh you use. It’s not fair that businesses aren’t charged the same.

[–] Jesus_666@lemmy.world 1 points 34 minutes ago

The rationale here is that if you don't give handouts like that to major corporations, they'll go build their data center somewhere they do get handouts. And then you lose the tax income and jobs they generate.

Of course it sucks that the logic works like that but they do have the ball and the shareholders expect them to take it only to the most profitable location.

[–] smegger@aussie.zone 12 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

Yeah this is what I'm not understanding about these stories. Why not charge these datacenters according to the pressure they're putting on the power network?

[–] snooggums@piefed.world 7 points 6 hours ago

Large high volume purchasing always comes at a discount. It shouldn't for something like energy but it does.

[–] FaceDeer@fedia.io 2 points 6 hours ago
[–] bent@feddit.dk 5 points 8 hours ago

Data centers is pretty much the only reason we need to build more power in Norway.

That and the fact that the poptarts that runs our government want to use land power to power the oil and gas platforms in the north sea.