It Was Never Just about the Land
(Jenell Theobald/The Santa Clara)
My Elder says, Cut your ears, and you will live. Cut off your hand, you will live. Cut off your leg, you can still live. Cut off our water, we will not live more than a week.
- “Postcolonial Love Poem” (2021), Natalie Diaz (Mojave)
As history continues to show us, the theft of land doesn’t continue to occur for the simple act of ownership, but rather equates to the economic gain seized and produced from said land. Turning “unoccupied land” into profit is something that I didn’t need to understand by reading Indigenous literature; I've witnessed it since I was 12.
My town blends into other communities in San Jose, and isn’t memorable to the average person. But one might remember the big names like “Google,” “Topgolf” or even “The Pink Pond” that have brought swarms of money-hungry corporations, amateur golfers and wannabe influencers to town. Pockets of land that were once nothing more than gravel and piles of patchy grass transformed into opportunities for a better tomorrow.
Alviso—my home—is a place that I’ve fought to protect since before I understood how power and influence could tip a moral scale. A midway point—along the 237 freeway and in between Santa Clara and Milpitas. Alviso was once vibrant with its forgotten history, overfilled with flood waters and protected small pickleweed-eating salt marsh harvest mice and the other defenseless endangered animals; now it’s nothing more than a place stripped of its lasting land and equity in the hopes of a fruitful tomorrow. However, I ask: when is enough, enough?
With the alarming rising rates of AI usage, corporations like Meta, Google and even Microsoft must house their overheating AI servers in data centers built throughout the U.S., and now have their sights set here in our backyard. Right off the 237 Southbay freeway on Alviso Milpitas Road.
A Microsoft data center awaiting construction, powered by PG&E and down the way from Silicon Valley Water aims to power faster, reliable clean energy for when it’s needed most. The new project will have “18.7 gigawatts of service capacity” that will power “roughly 18 million homes,” as stated in a CalMatters article. While examining the estimated outcomes, the project and even location are ideal.
However, the new data center is merely 200 feet from Coyote Creek, a 64-mile-long river that spans from Milpitas all the way to Morgan Hill. This waterway—along with the neighboring wildlife refuge—is put in jeopardy along with all wildlife dependent on their aquatic habitat. Coyote Creek connects with both the Guadalupe and Alviso Slogue, the two main waterways that surround 3,080 acres of protected land in Alviso. Without prevention, all its inhabitants at the Don Edwards Wildlife Refuge will be at risk as the Microsoft data center “would disrupt the abundant wildlife and delicate ecosystems,” according to the Sierra Club Loma Prieta Chapter.
Alarmingly, immeasurable water usage threatens our quality of life here in Santa Clara County.
A data center’s servers are no different from an overheating computer during a long nighttime cramming session. Instead of powering off and cooling down with a built-in fan, AI servers must be cooled down using “ultrapure water,” as it is “ideal for cleaning,” and “thousands of times cleaner than drinking water.” According to a 2025 article from the Environmental and Energy Study, 80% of the freshwater used by data centers is evaporated due to the overheating servers scorching the supply. The remaining water is “discharged to municipal wastewater facilities.”
In comparison, it is estimated that a “medium-sized data center can consume up to roughly 110 million gallons of water per year.” This new data center pledges that they will use recycled water from the nearby treatment plant. But it’s difficult to trust their word as another center in San Jose aimed to do the same. Due to the demand of faster, reliable electricity to power AI servers, a 175,930 square-foot Equinix data center had to rely on “36 backup diesel generators and did not use recycled water because it was not feasible,” says Ellina Yin, the director of governmentelations and strategy at AllAI Consulting.
There is no question that this new data center would rely on our groundwater supply from San Jose Water Company, prioritizing cooling down AI servers rather than providing fresh water to Santa Clara County residents—it is already happening. Microsoft reported that “41% of its water withdrawals were from areas with water stress,” according to their 2024 Environmental Sustainability Report. On Jan. 9, CalMatters reported that California is officially no longer in a drought after 25 years. Are we willing to risk this long-awaited progress just to continue using AI for our every whim?
Along with “resource depletion, e-waste and rising energy consumption,” this data center sets to bring contaminants to Coyote Creek that will find their way to the Don Edwards Wildlife Refuge. This will harm the endangered animals by polluting their homes and poisoning their water source. If the wastewater used from this Microsoft data center is not discharged to the Silicon Valley Water Treatment Plant, it risks further endangering these dwindling wildlife populations protected by this refuge. Are those lives worth losing in the name of progress?
“San Jose is ready to deliver,” declared Mayor Matt Mahan after the project deal announcement last year. Using San Jose as a launch point for his state governor candidacy, he stated, “the best resistance to division is results” in his most recent social media post on X. However, is his zealous pursuit of embracing AI and creating a technological, advanced city leading towards the city’s ecological downfall? Will the current means justify the end results? Who is willing to make the sacrifice for the city’s technological advancement? Does truly embracing AI mean turning one’s back to small, defenseless animals who will soon become extinct without our intervention? Will our reliance on AI drain the city of its lasting natural resources?
And I still ask: when is enough, enough?