Build t Right

Journal · October 1, 2026

How to read the receipts

Fifteen claims about data centers, each with a verdict and its sources. Some of the verdicts cut against us.

The receipts page grades fifteen claims that people make about data centers. Each has a verdict and the sources behind it.

The verdicts are told by shape as well as by word, so they read the same in every light and without colour: true, partly true, exaggerated, not proven, false. Many are longer than one word, because the honest answer often is. One reads "true as to one operator, false as a generalization".

Several of the claims against data centers are true, in whole or in documented cases. They stay on the page. A ledger that graded only one side would not be worth reading.

The page also lists eight things our own side says that do not hold up, struck through and kept on the record.

If you find a number anywhere on this site that is not on that page, write to us. Corrections are posted there, dated, at the same prominence as the error. Read the receipts.