In 2025, Google consumed 10.9 billion gallons of water, up 34% in a single year and more than double its 2021 level, based on its 2026 Environmental Report. Amazon published its first absolute water figure in June 2026, and Microsoft declared itself water positive five years early. The IEA estimates global data centers consumed about 560 billion liters of water in 2023 and projects roughly 1,200 billion liters by 2030. Two-thirds of that 2023 total, 373 billion liters, was indirect water consumed at power plants, while 140 billion liters was direct on-site cooling and 47 billion liters was in hardware manufacturing. A UN University (UNU-INWEH) report published in June 2026 put 2025 data center water consumption at the equivalent of 1.8 million Olympic-sized pools, and its high-AI scenario reaches 9.3 trillion liters of AI-related water consumption by 2030. A separate 2025 peer-reviewed estimate by researcher Alex de Vries-Gao puts AI systems’ water footprint alone at 312 to 765 billion liters for 2025. Withdrawal counts all water taken in, while consumption counts only water not returned, mostly lost to evaporation. Shaolei Ren of UC Riverside told Bloomberg in 2025 that data centers typically evaporate about 80% of the water they draw. Company figures include Amazon (AWS) withdrawing 2.5