Oracle’s AI data center, being constructed in Saline Township MI is a major source of storage for information and data. Oracle and Open AI have partnered with Related Digital which is a data center development and investment platform that Oracle is using for its services to construct a data center that’s around $7 billion and will be developed across 250 acres of Saline Township. Oracle is also partnering with DTE Energy to develop and support the data center by providing power to the data center.
“AI doesn't have a great reputation, and, overall, people don't want the data center. I'm sure there are also people who AI helps a lot in their jobs and are excited about the AI Help Center or data center,” Mitchell Rezler 26’ said
There are approximately 5,427 data centers that are up and running in the U.S., with more on the way. According to a blog on Oracle.com, this data center alone will create 2,500 union construction jobs and 450 on-site jobs across the board.
“Maybe in the area it'll provide a couple of jobs for the people building it and stuff. But I'm not sure how many workers there actually are in the data center in the long run. It takes more jobs from other people, and overall, it's not very beneficial,” Rezler said
Liquid cooling is a very important and essential part of the AI data centers across the globe, and almost all data centers use this method of cooling, including Oracle's data center that’s being constructed in Saline township. The liquid cooling systems are used to manage the heat caused by the high-density electronics in the data center to ensure safety for the equipment, employees, and electronics.
“I believe it stores information so that they can, at least to my knowledge, kind of put that into the AI's programming so it can kind of think for itself and basically take the information and apply it to its own duties, whatever they may be programming it to do,” Tanner Linde (‘26) said.
The growth of AI data centers around the country poses a huge challenge to knowing its success and what is to come. Some people say that AI tech is going to be a very big benefit of the future and our society, while on the other hand some people think that the technology could harm humans and possibly cause them more harm than good.
“Some people see the possibilities with it, where it can improve medical advances. We can use it to do jobs a lot of people wouldn't want to do, or harder jobs that maybe humans can't do. They can store a lot of information that would be hard for a standard person to do, and they can keep it safely backlogged,” Linde said
Some people use these data centers and their AI technology for generating funny and pointless photos or videos solely for their entertainment. These are usually poorly generated and often posted on social media networks as entertainment videos. Students think that these videos can be annoying and sometimes obnoxious and with that AI was used for good measures.
“I think the worst-case scenario is that it just goes nowhere, and people just use AI to make crappy images of stuff. Slop. And that's the only thing we get. I'd rather have evil robots than AI slop, to be honest,” Linde said.
