Massive data center development has become the bane of many American communities. And for good reason: They threaten to suck up limited water and electricity supplies, drive up energy bills and power an AI future many have come to fear. A bipartisan backlash includes places like Seattle, whose City Council passed a freeze on new facilities and even Texas, where Republican Gov. Greg Abbott also pressed pause to audit projects in his state.
The easiest choice for elected leaders across the country might be to seize the populist revolt and default to “no”: ban them outright and disallow new data centers entirely. But there are pitfalls to this strategy, which risks funneling their development to places that lack any environmental protections and ultimately lead to surging levels of pollution that impact us all.
Consider Amazon’s recently revealed plans for a colossal data center in Texas’ Permian Basin. The acres of servers would be powered by a 7.65 GW (natural gas) power plant — roughly the equivalent to the average daily generation Bonneville Power Administration provides across four states.
The plant has been authorized for up to 33 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions per year. That is a level at which no other single point source operates in the United States, The New York Times reported.
This is particularly disappointing for a company whose plans have now placed a wedge in its climate pledge — going net zero on carbon emissions by 2040. So much for proclaiming it with the magnitude that includes the branding of an iconic Seattle arena.
Margaret Callahan, an Amazon spokeswoman, told the editorial board that the new project won’t raise electricity costs for customers and that the company is exploring the possibility of adding solar power and battery storage to the project. Things that in Texas, the company is doing voluntarily.
Washington state wouldn’t allow such a monstrosity. But it could shape its regulations in a way that develops inevitable data center growth in a sustainable way.
Advocates for this approach include Rep. April Berg, D-Mill Creek, who heads the House Finance Committee. Banning data centers isn’t the right thing to do, because, you’re “taking yourself away from the table as a policymaker, and that’s not OK,” Pluribus News reported her saying at the recent National Conference of State Legislatures’ summit in Chicago.
Berg, a progressive Democrat rumored to be challenging Rep. Laurie Jinkins, D-Tacoma, for House speaker this year, seems an unusual champion for this cause. Her case is built on the premise that if new data center construction were to be banned in Washington state, they will simply be built elsewhere.
“They’re going to go in places that will be maligned and hurt because policymakers in states like mine are pushing away from the table, saying we don’t want to talk about data centers,” Berg said.
In 2022, Berg sponsored a refreshing of the state’s data center tax exemption that required developers to meet rigorous environmental building standards and use organized labor for construction and upkeep.
Policymakers can and should have a limit to what’s allowed in this state. The Times editorial board has called for common sense data-center regulations: they should replenish water supplies, ensure utility bills don’t surge for other customers and ultimately leave communities better off by their operation.
But an outright ban on all data centers simply assures they’ll be built in places like Texas’ Permian Basin, which lack Washington state’s commitments to sustainability.
Climate change doesn’t respect borders. The carbon emissions generated at Amazon’s future Texas plant will still accumulate in an atmosphere we all share.
Gov. Bob Ferguson and state lawmakers also owe it to the residents of Washington to perform a good-faith effort to see how data centers could partner to improve our antiquated, increasingly congested electricity grid, and add desperately needed new sources of energy to it. To Amazon’s credit, the company is also investing in those areas and increasing the prospects for developing new clean, continuous sources of electricity. The company has bankrolled $500 million into Energy Northwest, which is constructing a new generation of small modular nuclear reactors near Tri-Cities.
But far more electricity generation and transmission must be built, and it’s simply not happening fast enough in Washington state. Despite ruling Democrats’ ambitious climate mandates — power utilities here must produce net zero emissions by 2030 — the state ranks 50th out of 50 in clean energy growth. Could the AI gold rush help Washington catch up and achieve its climate goals?
Consider the following scenarios:
Option 1: Construction of a data center in Washington state with a closed loop water system and electricity generated with solar arrays and battery storage that feed an enhanced local electricity grid with surplus power.
Option 2: Build a server warehouse powered by a massive combined-cycle methane-fueled power plant that emits heat trapping greenhouse gases 24/7, whose electrons never support the wider electricity grid.
Which would you pick?
For the companies like Amazon that are building them: Please don’t destroy the planet — and Mainstreet America — with massive hydrocarbon-powered data centers not connected to the power grid. Replenish water supplies. Improve the grid. And don’t corner the electrons and produce them in ways that will increase pollution for the rest of us.
For policymakers regulating the data centers: A ban locally doesn’t prevent the data center from getting built elsewhere. Use your authority to make sure these new facilities are accountable to local communities, do not hog precious supplies of water, electricity and land, and can be stewards of the clean energy transition, rather than the exacerbators of climate change.
