It happened in Oregon. It happened in Arizona. It is happening across North America. And it could happen here.
When a data centre comes to town, the developer makes promises. Low water usage. Air cooling. Good neighbour. These commitments help secure zoning approvals and calm resident concerns. But once the shovels are in the ground, those promises have a troubling habit of quietly shifting.
This is the cooling bait-and-switch — a pattern repeated across the continent that residents of the proposed Goldfinch Lands data centre need to understand before it is too late.
The Dalles, Oregon — Google’s Broken Promise
When Google arrived in The Dalles in 2006, the company publicly committed to using recycled and reclaimed water for cooling. The community welcomed the project on that assurance. By 2019, Google was drawing more than 4 million gallons per day of potable drinking water during peak summer — not recycled water, not reclaimed, but drinking water from the municipal supply. The switch happened quietly after the facility was operational. The community had no legal recourse to enforce the original commitment.
Boardman, Oregon — Amazon’s Cooling Switch
Amazon sought approval for a facility in Boardman around 2018, explicitly promising air-cooled systems during the approval process. Local officials approved based on that representation. After construction, Amazon switched to evaporative cooling, drawing up to 4 million gallons per day from the local aquifer — water that farmers in the region depend on. The result: documented tension with agricultural users during drought periods. The air-cooling promise that helped secure approval was simply abandoned once the facility was too big to stop.
Chandler, Arizona — The Cumulative Crisis
In the Phoenix metro area, multiple data centres set up in Chandler on various cooling promises. Today they compete with residential wells during a groundwater depletion crisis threatening the entire region. No single operator broke a promise in a way easy to challenge, but the cumulative effect is devastating. One facility at a time, each promising low-water designs, the aquifer is drawn down unsustainably.
Northern Virginia — When Density Exceeds Supply
The world’s largest data centre market tells a similar story. The sheer density of facilities has pushed water demand beyond what local utilities can sustainably provide, despite many operators promising low-water designs. When every facility uses evaporative cooling, the math stops working — but by the time the impact is obvious, the facilities are already built and drawing water.
Why This Keeps Happening
Air cooling is less water-intensive but less efficient for high-density computing — and new AI workloads demand ever-denser configurations. Evaporative cooling saves operators money and supports those denser racks but consumes massive amounts of water. The industry is shifting toward liquid cooling for AI chips like NVIDIA’s GB200, which can use even more water. The economics push toward water use regardless of what was promised during approval. Once a facility is built, communities have virtually no legal mechanism to enforce promises made years earlier.
What This Means for Goldfinch
Diode’s own FAQ contains a troubling escape clause: “the exact cooling strategy for the data center will be determined at the development permit stage.” This explicitly leaves the door open to switch from air to evaporative cooling after zoning is approved. Diode also says they “will not use any water from the local aquifer” — but that is a website statement, not a legally binding condition of approval. The eventual end user — whoever buys and operates the site — will make the final cooling decision, not Diode. If the pattern has held everywhere else, it will hold here too.
What Residents Should Demand
The solution is clear and needs to happen now, before approval. Residents should demand a legally binding cooling commitment written directly into the zoning bylaw — with enforcement provisions that bind every future owner and give the community legal standing to act if those commitments are broken. Not a line on a website. Not an FAQ entry that can be changed with a single edit. A bylaw condition that travels with the land.
If Diode genuinely plans to use air cooling, they should have no problem putting that commitment in the bylaw where it can be enforced. If they won’t — ask yourself why.
The cooling bait-and-switch has played out in Oregon, Arizona, and Virginia. It could play out in Wheatland County too — unless the community insists on promises that are legally binding, not just persuasive.
Learn more about the Goldfinch proposal and get involved in protecting our community’s water.