The ocean is unpredictable. The breeze picks up. A current sweeps in. Then all of a sudden you are hit by wave after wave and struggling to keep your head above water.
This is not one of those moments. We can all see this one coming.
As the world braces for the AI revolution, chemical producers are preparing a new tidal wave of PFAS forever chemicals. As ChemSec recently revealed, their idea is to immerse the machinery of AI, housed in data centres, in tanks of PFAS.
PFAS are highly persistent toxins, highly mobile, and come with a range of alarming health issues. The public has known how problematic they are since the late 1990s. And some companies have even known since the 1950s.
This is not news. The new tide of digital pollution is predictable — not just because we understand the dangers, but because we have already gone through it.
Yet despite rising public opposition to PFAS, major chemical producers are silently ramping up their production in anticipation of the AI boom. The same companies that have been creating a dependence on PFAS in critical industries are now pushing for another carve-out for PFAS-use.
Instead of surfing the web, we will be sinking beneath a new wave of forever chemicals.
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The EU can still stop PFAS in data centre cooling
As we speak, policy makers in the EU are working on shutting the door on forever chemicals forever. But the proposed universal PFAS restriction contains a loophole for data centres, allowing companies to continue selling and using PFAS cooling systems for another 13.5 years.
That means your child could start Kindergarten next year and still finish high school before companies in Europe have to stop using PFAS for data centre cooling.
There is no need whatsoever for this derogation. Data centre cooling technologies without PFAS already exist, are commercially available, and in fact dominate the market.
Europe must act now to stem the tide of PFAS and protect future generations from this predictable disaster-in-the-making.
Apart from the pollution, allowing PFAS producers to carve out an exception for data centre cooling only serves to punish companies playing by the rules while stifling innovation of new cooling techniques.
AI technology is moving fast. But chemical companies are moving faster, trying to sneak in one more PFAS addiction. If they have it their way, Europe will be locked into another avoidable PFAS dependence, and we will be hit by yet another tidal wave of forever chemicals.
PFAS pollution will outlast the infrastructure that produces it by generations, which is why governments and regulators must insist on a full and rapid phase-out of forever chemicals.
We are watching as the next wave builds to menacing proportions. Europe must act now to stem the tide of PFAS and protect future generations from this predictable disaster-in-the-making.
