Can We Really Cool AI Data Centers With Pee? The Funny Ad With a Serious Point

The joke that started it

A beverage brand teamed up with a former NFL player for a funny ad suggesting people should donate their pee to help cool AI data centers, since those centers are known to use huge amounts of water. It was meant as an over-the-top joke, complete with people singing about it — but it went viral because it touches on a real, growing concern: AI is thirsty, and people are noticing.

Why pure urine wouldn't actually work

If you actually poured urine into a cooling system, you'd have a mess on your hands. Urine contains salt, urea, and other substances that would very quickly clog machinery and leave behind grimy mineral deposits. So no, data centers don't directly use unpurified pee.

But recycled wastewater? That's actually real

Here's the plot twist: purified wastewater — the kind that starts out as sewage, urine included, but then goes through thorough treatment — is in fact being used today to cool data centers. Modern treatment plants use filters, a process called reverse osmosis, and ultraviolet light to turn dirty water into something clean enough for industrial cooling. Companies in this industry say they've been doing this for entire industries for decades, not just for tech.

One concrete example: in a part of Virginia with more than 250 data centers, about 43% of all cooling water in 2025 was recycled wastewater instead of fresh drinking water. That's a significant saving, even though more than half still came from ordinary drinking water supplies.

The catch

Not every data center can simply switch to recycled water — you need to be physically close to a treatment plant large enough to handle the volume, and many data centers are built in rural areas that don't have that kind of infrastructure nearby. That's why some tech companies have started directly paying for the construction or upgrade of local wastewater treatment plants, since it benefits both the surrounding community and their own data centers.

The bigger picture

This whole conversation is happening at a time when a large majority of Americans say they don't want a data center in their neighborhood, largely due to concerns about water and electricity use. The funny ad worked precisely because it touched on something people are already worried about.