NPR

Google Moves In And Wants To Pump 1.5 Million Gallons Of Water Per Day

The company says it needs that much water to cool its servers at a South Carolina data center. Now, community leaders are having to balance economic benefits with environmental impact.
Clay Duffie of Mount Pleasant Waterworks says in some ways he's pleased the debate over Google's data center is heightening local awareness about the long-term sustainability of the water supply. "It's raised the issue that these resources are not limitless," he said.

When three sacred staples of the South weren't safe from the cloudy, salty water in his town, Clay Duffie knew there was a problem.

"It'd kill your azaleas if you irrigated with it; your grits would come out in a big clump, instead of creamy like they should," Duffie said.

Even the sweet tea.

"Your tea would come out all cloudy," Duffie said. "Oh man, it was bad news."

Duffie, the general manager of , said before his agency outside Charleston began purifying the water in the early 1990s, the water was also soft; you'd come out of

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