With nearly 30 years of experience managing underground aquifers, building natural gas generating stations, and developing electric transmission projects, I have reviewed the numbers behind this proposal with a practiced eye.

The data center’s cooling water needs are estimated at approximately 13,000 acre-feet per year. Depending on the technology chosen, that figure could range from as little as 4,000 acre-feet with primarily air cooling to as much as 64,000 acre-feet using the most water-intensive systems.

Where will the water come from?

It will come from existing agricultural water rights currently used to irrigate alfalfa. Importantly, this water does not reach the Great Salt Lake today. It is pumped from the aquifer, applied to fields, and then partially absorbed by crops, evaporated from the soil, or returned to the aquifer. None of it flows to the lake.

The Hansel Valley aquifer is recharged by local snowmelt and rainfall. Water moves very slowly through its porous rock. Because the portion of the aquifer beneath the Great Salt Lake is filled with lake water, it creates higher pressure that pushes saline groundwater toward Hansel Valley. Meanwhile, wells in the valley pull water northward, away from the lake. Due to these pressure differentials, aquifer water from the valley does not reach the Great Salt Lake. Therefore, whether the data center uses 4,000 or 64,000 acre-feet, its operation will not affect Great Salt Lake water levels.

What about the heat generated by the facility?

The combined data center and power plant are projected to produce about 16 gigawatts (GW) of waste heat. Some have claimed this will harm the Great Salt Lake watershed. That assertion does not hold up under scrutiny.

The Great Salt Lake watershed covers roughly 22,000 square miles, according to the Utah Division of Water Resources. The solar energy absorbed daily across that area (net of surface reflection) totals approximately 11,000 GW. The 16 GW from the project represents just 0.145% — about one-seventh of one percent — of the watershed’s daily solar heat input.

Heat from the facility will rise and disperse with prevailing winds. Roughly 50% of heat in the watershed escapes to space as long-wave infrared radiation through the atmospheric window. Another 20-30% is dissipated through evaporation and plant transpiration, with the remainder lost via conduction and convection. The additional heat from the project is negligible in this context.

Locally, Hansel Valley will experience a modest “heat island” effect. However, prevailing winds will carry most of this heat away, and any residual warming represents a tiny fraction of the overall watershed’s energy balance. Spring runoff from Hansel Valley averages only 8,000 acre-feet, compared with the lake’s total annual inflows of about 3.665 million acre-feet. Even if the added heat evaporated 25% of that runoff, the impact on the lake would be just 0.05%–a minuscule amount.

Hansel Valley lies within the vast sagebrush steppe and salt desert shrublands that define the Great Basin. The valley itself spans about 237 square miles. The proposed 40,000-acre project footprint equals 62.5 square miles. For comparison, Box Elder County currently has about 85,000 acres (132 square miles) of irrigated farmland, much of it in alfalfa.

Converting sagebrush and juniper habitat for agriculture removes the native ecosystem that supports sage-grouse, pronghorn, rabbits, coyotes, and other wildlife. Yet Utahns have long accepted this agricultural land use without significant protest. The proposed data center would disturb a far smaller area and cause no greater ecological harm than equivalent farmland expansion.

Utah residents have never objected to the roughly $24 million in annual GDP generated by farming activities on similar land. It is inconsistent to reject the hundreds of millions in additional GDP and high-paying jobs the data center would bring, especially when its measurable effects on the Great Salt Lake watershed and local environment would be minimal.

Joel Dickson graduated from Weber State University with a bachelors degree in Econometrics and from the University of Utah with a masters degree in Business Administration, and worked his entire career in the natural resources industry including for Mt Fuel Supply (the forerunner to Enbridge energy) Rocky Mountain Power and American States Water Company. He currently lives in Pleasant View.