It feels like almost over night we went from not doing enough but caring about carbon emissions and the impending calamity that they will cause to just... not, and and completely forgetting about them and what's about to happen. No real discussion about it in the media, no government policies, or lip service to the topic, just radio silence. The only real environmental discussions that rise up are about water usage near data centres, no bigger picture stuff.
It's really disturbing how a handful of people can just decide that this is the direction of the global economy and resource allocation, there's no democratic discussion about this or input from experts on climate, economics, or domestic security and self-sufficiency.
I don't really feel like we live in any close to a democracy in western countries anymore, it just seems like the locus of control is firmly outside of the average person, institutions, or even the moderately wealthy. It's just a few deranged people with more dollars than sense steering the ship into the rocky shore of a desert island.
Is there any evidence of this? If anything they're pretty vocal at refuting that. Otherwise it just sounds like "everyone more radical than me are false flag industry shills to make the movement look bad, and everyone less radical than me are industry plants trying to water legislation down".
The climate impact, like with cars or the oil industry is a boring future issue.
And personally I expect that datacenter buildout to slow down. The AI bubble won't last, and average dude in the street simply won't up their spending on AI (applications) to a level that justifies the ongoing buildout.
Yes lots of resources will be wasted. But it won't last, markets & investors will correct the situation somehow.