Across the United States, lawmakers are increasingly caught between two competing pressures: the massive investment flowing into the tech industry to build AI data centers, and a growing, bipartisan backlash against those same facilities, not to mention the massive tech corporations funding them.
In New York, governor Kathy Hochul is giving in to the former — at least on paper — by announcing a one-year, state-wide ban on new AI data center construction for facilities with an electrical capacity of 50 megawatts and up.
It’s the first time a US state has imposed such a moratorium, highlighting persistent concerns over the rampant pollution, alarming water usage rates, and rising electricity prices.
Per the City Reporter, the governor has ordered state utility regulators to draft “the strongest standards in the nation for data center development,” in order to guarantee that “when companies succeed because of New York, New Yorkers succeed too.”
