Microsoft promises to run “water positive” by 20301. It plans to put back more water than its data centers use, through watershed work and community projects. Virginia's own data tell a different story. Data centers there drew 2.1 billion gallons in 2023, up 86% from 2019, in the state with the most hyperscale campuses on earth2. Pledges and usage now grow side by side. The gap between them is the year's sharpest infrastructure fight.
Virginia data centers drew 2.1 billion gallons of water in 2023, up 86% from 2019
Water drawn by data centers in Virginia in one year, in billions of gallons
The gray column is the 2019 draw that the 86 percent rise implies, and the magenta column is the 2.1 billion gallons drawn in 2023.
Source: Wikipedia [2]. Chart by Kelly Dennis.
The numbers behind this chart
| Item | Value | Note |
|---|---|---|
| 2019 | 1.13 billion | Implied by the reported 86 percent rise to 2.1 billion gallons |
| 2023 | 2.1 billion | In the state with the most hyperscale campuses on earth |
The Pledge Microsoft Makes
Microsoft's water plan has five parts, per its own responsibility page1. The company sums them up in one sentence. "We're minimizing water use, replenishing local watersheds, investing in community-driven water solutions, advancing innovation, and shaping policies that support water resilience in the AI era." Wins follow. AI-guided irrigation saved 1.5 million cubic meters in Chile's Maipo Basin, and 111 water projects run with outside partners.
Ambition on that scale reads well, and Microsoft deserves credit for setting a public target at all. Several rivals skip the step. Few tech executives face public water questions the way Satya Nadella's company does, given how visibly the Azure buildout drives those fights from Virginia to Arizona.
What the Pledge Leaves Out
Read the page closely and the gap appears. The pledge skips a baseline water figure1. Year-over-year progress goes unpublished. So does any interim target an investor or regulator could check before 2030. A promise measured only at the end leaves outsiders guessing whether 2027 shows real progress or more growth awaiting a late fix.
Outside data fill part of the gap, and they cut against a story of steady gains. Global data center water use hit roughly 560 billion liters a year, on a path to double by 2030, the same year the pledge comes due2. One 100-megawatt site can draw up to 2 million liters a day. That scales directly with the gigawatt campuses hyperscalers now build as routine. Set the pledge beside the data and a question stays open, one that Microsoft's page and most coverage of it leave alone. Does “water positive” mean net global impact, per-site efficiency, or something else, and which number will an investor get to audit in 2030?
Irina Raicu directs the Internet Ethics program at Santa Clara University's Markkula Center for Applied Ethics. CalMatters quoted her in May 2026 reporting on California's data center boom, drawn from research by Next10 and her own university. "We have this huge build out, and we have very little data," Raicu said7. She names the same imbalance Microsoft's page leaves open: a company publishes the target number, 2 million liters a day, and skips the year-by-year count that would turn the pledge into a tally a reader can check.
The Numbers Behind the Grid Strain
Water is one problem. Power is the other. The International Energy Agency put global data center power at roughly 415 terawatt-hours in 20242. That is about 1.5% of world electricity, growing 12% a year over the prior five years, headed for 945 terawatt-hours by 2030. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory found US sites used 4.4% of national electricity in 2023. Its projection reaches 6.7% to 12% by 2028, with data centers driving nearly half of all US demand growth through 2030.
Grid operators feel it now. A 2024 voltage event in the PJM region cut roughly 1,500 megawatts of data center load at once, across about 60 sites2. The North American Electric Reliability Corporation cited it when naming data centers the largest single driver of demand growth. Consumers pay part of the cost. Virginia home bills could rise $14 to $37 a month by 2030, and national prices could climb roughly 8%. Gas still supplies 40% of the power behind American data centers, with renewables at 24%, nuclear near 20% and coal at 15%. That mix explains why nuclear deals became the infrastructure story of 2025 and 2026.
Gas supplies 40% of the power behind American data centers, and nuclear supplies near 20%
Share of the power behind American data centers, by source, percent
The bar is all the power behind American data centers, each segment is one source's share, and nuclear is the magenta segment.
Source: Wikipedia [2]. Chart by Kelly Dennis.
The numbers behind this chart
| Item | Value | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Gas | 40% | |
| Renewables | 24% | |
| Nuclear | 20% | Near 20 percent, the source Microsoft, Google and Amazon each turned to |
| Coal | 15% |
Three Buyers Solve It With Reactors
Microsoft signed a 20-year power deal with Constellation Energy in September 20246. It restarts the undamaged Unit 1 reactor at Three Mile Island, renamed the Crane Clean Energy Center3. Joseph Dominguez, Constellation's president and chief executive, made the case in one sentence. "Powering industries critical to our nation's global economic and technological competitiveness, including data centers, requires an abundance of energy that is carbon-free and reliable every hour of every day, and nuclear plants are the only energy sources that can consistently deliver on that promise." Count the words he pairs. Carbon-free, and reliable every hour, which is what renewables struggle to deliver alone.
Governor Josh Shapiro put the state's stake more plainly. "Pennsylvania's nuclear energy industry plays a critical role in providing safe, reliable, carbon-free electricity that helps reduce emissions and grow Pennsylvania's economy."6 The Trump administration announced a $1 billion loan for the restart in November 20253.
Google took a parallel path through Kairos Power4. A 2024 deal covered several advanced reactors, and an August 2025 deal covered the Hermes 2 reactor. It sends 50 megawatts through the Tennessee Valley Authority to Google sites in Alabama and Tennessee, targeted for 2030. TVA became the first US utility to sign such a deal with an advanced nuclear plant.
Amazon bought instead of contracting. AWS took Talen Energy's Cumulus data center campus for $650 million in March 20245. A power deal came with it, drawing on Talen's Susquehanna nuclear plant, 2.5 gigawatts on Pennsylvania's Susquehanna River, where Talen holds 90% and full control. Restart, new reactor, campus plus contract: three structures, one problem. Each secures carbon-free power around the clock, outside the grid queues that now stretch years.
Three buyers reaching the same answer inside eighteen months points to a shared engineering view. Renewables plus storage remain years from delivering firm gigawatts fast enough for AI training schedules. Utilities that spent decades treating nuclear plants as aging assets now field competing bids from tech firms buying decades of power. Few analysts saw that turn coming three years ago. Constellation, Talen and Kairos Power sit at three different stages, and all three report AI demand as a main growth story.
By the numbers
- Virginia data center water use rose 86% from 2019 to 2023, reaching 2.1 billion gallons2.
- A $1 billion federal loan, announced November 2025, backs the Three Mile Island restart for Microsoft3.
- Twenty years: the length of the Microsoft power deal signed with Constellation in September 20246.
- Talen Energy's Susquehanna nuclear plant, 2.5 gigawatts, now powers Amazon's Cumulus data center campus5.
- Kairos Power's Hermes 2 reactor will send 50 megawatts to Google through a Tennessee Valley Authority deal4.
- Roughly 1,500 megawatts of data center load dropped in the 2024 PJM voltage event, across about 60 sites2.
- The IEA projects global data center power use at 945 terawatt-hours by 2030, up from about 415 in 20242.
What to watch
Microsoft's next sustainability report answers one question1. Does the company start publishing the baseline and interim numbers its water pledge omits? That one step would let outside analysts test the 2030 target. Three Mile Island's restart timeline, now backed by a federal loan, gives a near-term marker for whether nuclear deals land on schedule or slip36. Watch grid-queue data from regional operators this year, for signs of whether the PJM event stands alone or starts a pattern2.
Sources
- Microsoft, "Water," Microsoft Corporate Responsibility, 2026, https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/corporate-responsibility/sustainability/water
- Wikipedia contributors, "Data center," Wikipedia, accessed Sept. 1, 2026, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_center
- U.S. Department of Energy, "Energy Department Closes Loan to Restart Nuclear Power Plant in Pennsylvania," Nov. 18, 2025, https://www.energy.gov/articles/energy-department-closes-loan-restart-nuclear-power-plant-pennsylvania
- Google, "Our First Advanced Nuclear Reactor Project With Kairos Power and Tennessee Valley Authority," Aug. 18, 2025, https://blog.google/outreach-initiatives/sustainability/google-first-advanced-nuclear-reactor-project-with-kairos-power-and-tennessee-valley-authority/
- World Nuclear News, "Talen Sells Carbon-Free Data Centre to Amazon Cloud Company," March 5, 2024, https://www.world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/Talen-sells-carbon-free-data-centre-to-Amazon-clou
- Constellation Energy, "Constellation to Launch Crane Clean Energy Center, Restoring Jobs and Carbon-Free Power to The Grid," Sept. 20, 2024, https://www.constellationenergy.com/news/2024/Constellation-to-Launch-Crane-Clean-Energy-Center-Restoring-Jobs-and-Carbon-Free-Power-to-The-Grid.html
- Rachel Becker, "Data Centers Are Guzzling California's Water. We Have No Idea How Much," CalMatters, May 16, 2026, https://calmatters.org/environment/water/2026/05/california-data-centers-water-transparency/