But it doesn’t have to be drinking water. Nuclear power plants, for example, often use 3 cooling circuits. The first two are closed loops, in order to avoid release of radioactive nuclides. The coolant is condensed (using heat exchangers with the next circuit) and recirculated. The last circuit is often just river water or similar that’s thrown out after use. Even the evaporated water isn’t an issue, since it will fall back as rain somewhere. The atmosphere has a limited capacity to hold water vapor.
My real concern with AI isn’t water at all. It’s the energy usage. Water (not drinking water) is renewable. The bulk of the electric power supply is not. Perhaps someday, there will be technology to do the training with much less power. But today it’s unsustainable. But the big players will keep doing it, since they make money off of it. The incentives are just as perverse as with the crypto mining industry. And just like crypto, AI is headed in a way where a few rich players have all the edge to become even richer, at the expense of regular folks.