Hunger Games: AI's Demand For Resources Poses Promise And Peril To Rural America

Authored by James Varney via RealClearInvestigations,

HOLLY RIDGE, La. – More than three millennia ago, indigenous people built a massive ceremonial mound a few miles from here, an engineering marvel called Poverty Point and one of the oldest known building projects in North America. Today, this is ground zero for what may prove a defining feature of the 21st century’s landscape.

Meta, the parent company of Facebook, is constructing a gargantuan, $10 billion data center that tech executives, lawmakers, and business leaders say will bring much-needed prosperity to this rural area in northeast Louisiana. Set to be operational by 2030, the project has also disturbed local homeowners and drawn opposition from environmental and government activists who worry that it will suck up vast resources, especially water and energy, from surrounding communities. 

As tech companies plan to build more data centers around the country to fuel the boom in artificial intelligence, this massive project provides a window into the issues swirling around what many see as the next phase of the digital revolution. 

Meta’s Hyperion project in Richland Parish will be the company’s biggest in a constellation of 28 centers across 19 states, Europe, and Singapore. With tech giants investing heavily in AI, it is estimated that the current crop of more than 5,000 U.S. data centers, which first sprouted to handle cloud computing, represent just half of what will be needed as AI brings radical change to computing, education, medicine, and other fields by mid-century.

Already, millions of Americans have signed up for various AI programs, such as ChatGPT (Microsoft) or Grok (Elon Musk) or Meta AI, and last month, the Trump administration released an “American AI Action Plan.” Meta co-founder Mark Zuckerberg has dubbed 2025 “the defining year of AI,” and, as if to prove it, his company is spending $65 billion this year building out its platform.

Although AI is not producing the profits Wall Street craves, Meta, the parent of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, and other big tech stocks continue to soar. Just as cloud computing services have become major profit generators for Amazon, Apple, Meta, and others, AI is expected to bring billions into individual and corporate accounts.

AI’s Energy Appetite

Whether AI becomes the amoral killer of the human race, as Hollywood and many futurists have envisioned, or improves the lives of billions of people, as its champions insist, there is no disputing that data centers are insatiable in their power demands. The high-tech warehouses require energy to operate millions of GPU servers stacked in rows that stretch out like banks of speakers at a Rolling Stones concert, as well as their futuristic air conditioning and water-cooling systems. By 2028, the centers, which are also known as “hyperscalers,” are expected to consume 12% of all U.S. energy, or more than California, Florida, and New Jersey combined.

The scale of the operation here is immense. At the moment, Hyperion sprawls over 2,250 acres, but eventually it is expected to cover six square miles of the flat American plain that begins on the west bank of the Mississippi River. Holly Ridge is so small its population is not listed in the most recent census, but the data center plot here could contain Heathrow International Airport.

The centers also require lakes of water. As the servers run nonstop, they are sometimes surrounded by a network of cooling tubes and towers of chilled water to absorb heat. In some cases, the servers even sit in a pool of liquid that absorbs heat. A Meta data center in Georgia that is much smaller than Hyperion uses around 500,000 gallons of water each day, and residents near data centers have reported issues with their home’s water systems, according to a New York Times report last month.

Holly Ridge’s operation will need more than 1 million gallons of water daily, according to a RealClearInvestigations estimate. That has raised concerns among environmental groups like the Sierra Club’s Delta chapter.

“We don’t believe it is sustainable,” the Sierra Club’s Angelle Bradford told RCI. “Our farmers in the area are concerned.”

Meta disputed Bradford’s assertion, saying Hyperion will use a “closed-loop system,” and that the company will disclose its water use annually, although Meta does so in the aggregate, making it difficult to determine what each individual hyperscaler uses. Meta says at no point will the local water table be imperiled. 

“The Richland Parish Data Center will use little to no water during the majority of the year,” a Meta spokesperson said. “We anticipate the data center may use less water than the site’s previous agricultural use.” 

In a sign of the distrust that surrounds such massive projects, the Sierra Club disputes that claim. “They are not using a closed cycle with water,” Bradford said.

The project’s backers say Louisiana is not called the Bayou State for nothing. Given the roughly 56 inches of annual rainfall in the state’s northeast, water should be plentiful. Michael Echols, a Republican state representative from Ouachita Parish, which adjoins Richland, said he is convinced there is sufficient water in the area now. If need be, Echols adds, Meta could have an endless supply by building a pipeline to the Mississippi River some 50 miles to the east – an idea that Bradford and others find impracticable.

Then there is the energy required to support such an undertaking. Take the tens of thousands of air conditioners blasting in New Orleans on a mid-August day and double that demand for Hyperion’s use, or 2.26 megawatts daily. The electricity is expected to be provided by Entergy, which this month urged state regulators to fast-track construction of three new gas-powered plants. 

Meta, which received major tax breaks when picking the Richland Parish site, has agreed to a 15-year power supply contract with Entergy,  while also promising to match what it uses with renewable energy. 

A Meta spokesperson said it was “working closely with Entergy to bring on at least 1,500 megawatts of renewable energy,” or the equivalent of the data center’s needs. In addition, the company has said it will contribute $1 million annually to Entergy’s customer assistance program.

Entergy did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Such voracious energy consumption bothers some groups that are concerned about global warming and the potential impact on residential electricity bills. Given gas plants like those Entergy is building have a 30-year lifespan, Meta’s deal will only cover half of that time, according to the Alliance for Affordable Energy, opening the door to rate increases after 15 years.

“It’s hard to understand or believe the numbers Meta and Entergy are using,” Alliance Executive Director Logan Burke said. “We have seen this happen with data centers in Georgia, Virginia, and Ohio, where the cost of electricity absolutely goes up as a result of all this.”

Virginia ratepayers have indeed seen increases since data centers began to crop up, an RCI analysis of the area showed. In April, Dominion Energy proposed substantial rate spikes that would increase costs for residential customers in Virginia by an average of $10 per month. 

Halcyon, a data platform that uses AI to analyze energy information from all 50 states, confirms that rates have been on the rise in Virginia and elsewhere. But it’s not clear those increases are because of data centers, Halcyon’s Jeff Fisher told RCI. 

Dominion noted this would mark its first increase in basic rates since 1992, and a more than 7.5% increase in Virginia’s population between 2010 and 2020 means supply and demand pressures would raise rates.

“Based on the information we’ve collected, there is legitimacy to the Alliance’s concerns, but I’m not seeing any causal evidence that consumers are actually paying more due to data centers,” Fisher said. “That doesn’t mean that they aren’t, just that the information that we have doesn’t explicitly demonstrate it.” 

Dan Golding, a former Google executive who is now a partner with data center consulting firm ASG in Virginia, bristled at the idea that they are to blame for higher rates. He cited power companies’ profits and the loss of other plants as more likely culprits.

“The other big reason is that with the planned shutdown of coal and nuclear-powered plants and their replacement by gas and eventually small modular reactors, the large transmission lines have to shift end-point locations,” he said. “That is extremely expensive.”

The Job Promise

Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry and state business development agencies hailed Meta’s selection of the Holly Ridge site when it was announced last December. At the same time, Entergy said it would spend $3 billion building the three new power plants, two near the site and another near the capital in Baton Rouge. The combined operation would bring some 5,000 construction jobs and 500 permanent jobs at the data center and 300 more at the power plants, according to the companies and the government.

Hyperion jobs will pay an average of $75,000, which is 150% of the median salary in the area, according to a recent report from Grow NELA, a Monroe, La., consulting firm.

Just what those jobs might be at centers that whir 24/7 remains unclear. At a minimum, they will need round-the-clock elite security, skilled electricians, air conditioning operators, engineers, and some tech wizards, most of whom must be available in three to four shifts, according to  Golding, who said the idea that a data center only needs a handful of unskilled workers is incorrect.

“I guarantee you that all these people raising concerns about data centers have never set foot in one and don’t know the first thing about how it works,” he said.

Grow NELA President Rob Cleveland said that to some degree, “we’re going on faith” regarding the center’s economic impact. But he added that there are already tangible benefits and anticipates a pronounced positive impact throughout northeast Louisiana.

The study commissioned by Grow NELA puts construction wages at more than $1.2 billion, of which $240 million is expected to go to local residents. The state should realize some $160 million in new sales taxes during the first five years, and nearly $62 million more in income tax, according to Grow NELA estimates. The project will also create many non-local jobs – including for those who design, build, program, and use the massive servers.

“I have never felt for one moment Meta was trying to take advantage of the local community,” Cleveland said. “People have no concept of what this will do for our communities, especially as before, you couldn’t find Holly Ridge on a map. My own land value has already doubled, and I can’t put a dollar amount on what it’s worth to have Mark Zuckerberg talking about our community for months now.” 

In all cases, Meta said it picks data center locations that are “shovel-ready sites that offer excellent access to fiber and a robust electric grid with access to reliable and renewable energy resources, and a strong pool of talent for both construction and operations staff.”

To better understand the economic impact of data centers, RCI surveyed facilities in Virginia, where, since 1992, about 200 of them have sprouted within 100 miles of Washington, D.C. Today, there are another 117 under active development, continuing a pace that has seen one under construction every day for the past 14 years in Loudoun County, Virginia.

This modern tech forest has brought an estimated “74,000 jobs, $5.5 billion in labor income and $9.1 billion in GDP to Virginia’s economy annually,” a state commission found in 2024. A typical 250,000 square foot data center in the state employs some 50 skilled workers, and a construction force of up to 1,500 spends 12 to 18 months building them.

Meta’s Louisiana facility dwarfs those currently operating in Old Dominion, but the figures used by the company, Grow NELA, and others seem accurate if one extrapolates from Virginia’s experience. 

“This is a critical facility and it’s phenomenally complicated,” Golding, the consultant, said. “You’re going to need IT technicians, super security, you’re going to have to spend millions over the years stacking up teams of people.”

The Great Unknown

At the moment, the shining future looks dirty. Just a few days before classes begin at Holly Ridge Elementary School, the air above the former corn and soybean fields was shot through with a fine, rust colored dust that arises from dozens of massive Caterpillar earth movers and dump trucks that crawl across the site. Construction cranes and freshly cut phone poles line the western side, and on the eastern squat, huge piles of dirt look like Mesopotamian ruins. Truck traffic on the freshly paved highways running along the eastern and southern sides is rumbling and nonstop.

Some Richland Parish residents – many who live in modest homes and trailer parks on the farmland surrounding the construction site, where church steeples can be seen from miles across the flat land – are wary of this modern tech wave. The hubbub, disruption, and congestion, and even the brave new future itself, have them expressing apprehension.

“I think there’s some concerns just in the change; people are nervous about all the unknowns,” said Larry Morris, who said his tire company in nearby Rayville has already seen a sizable boost in sales. “A lot of people are having trouble wrapping their heads around something this big.”

Meta is spending $200 million on infrastructure improvements, including roads, water systems, and housing. However, one resident noted that the improvements have actually increased her commute time to Holly Ridge Elementary School, now taking her three times longer on a freshly paved road.

The population in Richland and surrounding parishes is about 57% white and 37% black, and a majority of residents have high school diplomas with some college credit, according to the Grow NELA study. About one in four residents receive food stamps, with slightly less – about 20% – living on the poverty line.

Several residents said their concerns have been heightened by what they consider the silence surrounding the project. There were no town hall meetings and no public notices to provide information or give locals a voice in the sea change coming to their lives. The Sierra Club’s Bradford characterized the situation as one “that lacks clarity.”

Local critics who accuse Meta and Entergy of being too secretive point to redacted portions of the various contracts. Earlier this month, at an administrative law hearing in Baton Rouge, activists and reporters were frustrated that they were removed for considerable portions of the hearing due to executive session rules.

Several residents, all of whom expressed some fear of Meta and political figures and requested anonymity, told RCI they would be interested in selling their homes and land. Others said they are reluctant to leave the only area they have ever known. One woman said she owns roughly 70 acres near the data center site. An offer has been made to her for that property – she quoted a price of $55,000 an acre – which would leave her a millionaire several times over. But the family has lived there for decades and does not want to move.

Such uncertainty is understandable in a community that has been largely unruffled by change for decades, Rep. Echols said. But he and others said Richland Parish is getting with the times.

“I’d rather be hopeful about future progress than terrified about future poverty,” he said.

RealClear’s Lincoln Patience contributed to this report.