01
Human Welfare Is the Measure
A project should be judged by its effects on people and place, not only by computing capacity, capital investment, or speed to construction.
Practical Guide 006
Responsible AI Infrastructure
A Community Guide to Data Center Development.
Artificial intelligence infrastructure is physical. It depends on land, water, electricity, roads, safety systems, and communities. This is a practical public-education resource, neither automatic support nor automatic opposition.
Does this project serve the people and place that will live with its consequences?
Official Unautomated Position
Responsible digital infrastructure.
Unautomated supports the responsible development of digital infrastructure when the people, places, and public systems that host it are treated as part of the project rather than as costs that can be placed somewhere else.
We are neither reflexively for data center development nor reflexively against it. We reject the false choice between technological progress and community protection.
01
Evidence Before Certainty
A confident presentation is not proof. Major claims about water, power, noise, air, jobs, taxes, safety, and sustainability should be documented and independently reviewable.
02
Technology Without Complacency
A community should not assume every new project resembles an older facility. It should also not accept a label such as advanced, closed loop, or efficient without defined boundaries and measurable performance.
03
Conditions Instead of Wishes
Important protections belong in permits, agreements, ordinances, rates, plans, reporting duties, and enforcement provisions.
04
Responsibility Across Time
The review should address construction, normal operation, emergencies, expansion, ownership changes, equipment replacement, and the end of the facility life.
Complete review
What communities should examine.
A project should be understood as a complete physical system—not simply as a building, an investment figure, or a single first phase.
- 01
Complete scope
The full campus, planned phases, substations, transmission, generators, batteries, water and wastewater facilities, roads, and likely expansion.
- 02
Water and cooling
Water sources, withdrawal and consumption, wastewater, drought conditions, cooling design, and site-appropriate alternatives.
- 03
Electricity and the grid
Maximum demand, reliability, specialized infrastructure, ratepayer protection, and responsibility for cost and stranded risk.
- 04
Noise, air, and emergency readiness
Mechanical sound, vibration, generator testing, emissions, batteries, fuel, fire planning, responders, and emergency operations.
- 05
Land, roads, and construction
Siting, access, traffic, stormwater, construction impacts, compatible land use, and effects beyond the property line.
- 06
Public value
Permanent employment, taxes after incentives, public service costs, workforce opportunities, infrastructure improvements, and lasting benefit.
- 07
Accountability and closure
Written conditions, monitoring, public reporting, correction, material changes, decommissioning, site restoration, and financial security.
Start at the first meeting
Ten Questions Every Community Should Ask.
The purpose is to reveal the complete project, the hardest conditions, the ownership of risk, and the strength of accountability.
- 1
What is the complete project?
Ask for the full campus and intended buildout, not only the first phase.
- 2
What will it use on the hardest day?
Request maximum demand and emergency conditions, not only annual averages.
- 3
Where will the water come from, and what happens when it is scarce?
Distinguish water sources and require a mandatory shortage response.
- 4
Why was this cooling design selected?
Require a comparison of reasonable alternatives and their community tradeoffs.
- 5
What electrical infrastructure is required, and who carries the risk?
Identify the infrastructure, schedule, and responsibility if forecasts do not hold.
- 6
What will nearby people hear?
Examine continuous, tonal, low-frequency, generator, construction, and cumulative sound.
- 7
What are the air quality and emergency response obligations?
Review backup power, batteries, fuel, fire planning, responders, monitoring, and runoff control.
- 8
What public value remains after construction?
Separate temporary activity from permanent employment and lasting public benefit.
- 9
Which promises are binding and visible?
Convert important claims into written conditions, reporting, inspection, correction, and remedies.
- 10
What happens when the project changes or ends?
Address expansion, ownership changes, equipment, decommissioning, restoration, and continuing obligations.
Human First
Ten public principles for responsible digital infrastructure.
02
Place Matters
Water, electricity, air, public safety, roads, land, and emergency capacity are shared systems, not blank inputs.
03
Essential Resources Must Be Protected
04
The Project Should Carry the Costs It Creates
Residents and ordinary utility customers should not bear unreasonable financial, operational, environmental, or infrastructure risk.
05
Technology Claims Require Evidence
Terms such as closed loop, efficient, clean, renewable, quiet, and sustainable should be defined, measured, and independently reviewable.
06
The Best Design Is Site Appropriate
Communities should expect a documented comparison of available designs and a clear explanation of why the selected approach fits the location. A design that is responsible in one climate, watershed, grid, or land use pattern may be irresponsible in another.
07
Public Participation Must Be Meaningful
People should receive understandable information early enough to influence the project, not after the important choices are fixed.
08
Performance Must Remain Visible
Actual water, power, noise, emissions, incidents, and public commitments should be reported in a form the community can understand.
09
Problems Must Trigger Correction
Approval should include monitoring, response deadlines, remedies, and authority to require changes when actual performance differs from what was promised.
10
The Future Remains a Human Choice
No project is inevitable merely because demand is growing. Communities retain the standing to choose better technology, better terms, a better site, a different scale, or no project as proposed.
Free educational PDFs
Read, share, and use the complete materials.
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Free educational 44-page PDF
Community Toolkit
A Community Guide to Data Center Development
Open PDFFree educational PDF
Official Position Statement
The Official Unautomated Position on Data Center Development
Open PDFFree educational PDF
Ten Questions Every Community Should Ask
Before Approving a Data Center Development Project
Open PDFFree educational PDF
Human First Data Center Principles
Ten Public Principles for Responsible Digital Infrastructure
Open PDFFree educational 50-question PDF
Data Center Community Impact Scorecard
A structured review tool for the complete project and its conditions
Open PDFEducational resource only. These materials are not legal, engineering, environmental, utility, land-use, financial, public-safety, or regulatory advice. Every project is site specific. Communities should use qualified professionals and applicable law to evaluate a proposal and convert appropriate protections into enforceable public action.