As data center demand soars, Amazon expands use of recycled waste water to cool its cloud
Lisa Stiffler – GeekWire
June 9, 2025
Amazon Web Services is more than halfway to its 2030 goal of being “water positive” — meaning it replenishes more clean water than it uses. And supporting that effort is a newly announced initiative to expand its use of recycled waste water instead of drinking water to cool 120 of its U.S. data centers by the end of this decade.
AWS is wringing more water out of its cloud operations, marking a 40% improvement in its water use efficiency over the past three years. And it’s 53% of the way toward becoming water positive, based on 2024 data — up from 41% from the year before.
“We’re pretty proud of the fact that our global water use efficiency is really industry leading,” Kevin Miller, vice president of global data center operations for AWS, said in an interview.