The crunch for new data infrastructure is straining local utility companies in areas such as Northern Virginia owing to a requirement for "inhaling massive amounts of energy," a reality that leads to concerns that local residents will be asked to foot the bill in the end. 

Water use is also becoming an issue, despite smaller colocation centers being the more preferred building type. Still, the billions of dollars flowing into their construction are not expected to abate any time soon, according to a report last November from Dodge Data & Analytics, which predicted the boom to last at least another two full years.   

"Data centers might not seem like an exciting place for an architectural project," Dutch academic Marina Otero said last year at the announcement of her Wheelwright Prize win. "However, the huge scale of the operations of the data industry and its pervasiveness and increasing importance in the contemporary world — coupled with its openness to innovation and concurrent pressures to find better socio-ecological models — creates a fertile environment for experimentation and action."