This week’s Zoning In highlights how quickly the national conversation around AI infrastructure is shifting. Last night, Chandler made headlines with a unanimous vote rejecting a $2B AI data center after overwhelming community pushback. Next week, Nvidia will host a private summit to address the power shortages that are now slowing AI growth. Across the country, Palm Beach County has paused a major hyperscale proposal, Virginia lawmakers are moving to restrict siting and tax breaks, […]
This week’s Zoning In highlights how quickly pushback—and now litigation—is reshaping the data center landscape. National advocacy groups are assembling new legal tools to challenge AI facilities, as Amazon exits Tucson’s Project Blue, Michigan logs 5,000 public comments on a 1.4-GW power deal, and West Shreveport’s MPC rejects a 2.8-million-sq-ft campus. From Brandon, MS, to Hanover, VA, to Meta’s El Paso AI build, communities are demanding hard numbers on water, power, noise, and grid costs—and […]
This week’s Zoning In highlights a surge in oversight efforts — from Michigan environmental groups filing a case against a 1.4-GW proposal to Georgia adopting statewide review rules and Prince George’s County unveiling one of the most aggressive regulatory frameworks to date. Meanwhile, pushback remains strong in places like Wisconsin, Kansas City, and Essex, where residents are raising concerns around water use, rising utility rates, diesel emissions, and transparency. We also tracked several major flashpoints, […]
This week delivered one of the sharpest warnings yet that the U.S. data center surge is meeting organized, highly effective community resistance. From Virginia to Georgia, officials are tightening zoning regulations, demanding water and power disclosures, and pausing approvals as residents push back against diesel generators, rising utility costs, and closed-door negotiations. In a major shift, the Virginia Court of Appeals halted all construction on the PW Digital Gateway pending a citizen-led legal challenge. And […]
Communities across the country intensified their pushback against large data center projects this week, led by a viral TikTok in Kenosha that quickly grew into a 20,000-signature petition opposing Microsoft’s plans. From Illinois to North Carolina, residents raised fresh concerns about water use, noise, land conversion, and a lack of transparency, often learning about massive developments only after key decisions had already been made. Several reports highlighted how nondisclosure agreements and limited public disclosure continue […]
This week’s Zoning In tracks a surge of community protests, legal reversals, and ballot-box consequences. In Virginia, residents again rallied against new facilities and Dominion’s six-mile transmission line just as the Digital Gateway project won a temporary reprieve in court — and data centers became a defining issue in statewide elections. Across Springdale, PA and Ypsilanti, MI, environmental justice and transparency debates are reshaping how local leaders weigh promises of investment against noise, water, and […]
12 Months That Made One Thing Clear: Data Center Community Engagement Is No Longer Optional –Adam Waitkunas What’s Changed—and What Developers Must Do Next Twelve months ago, we launched Zoning In to track the fast-evolving intersection of data centers, land use, and community relations. In that time, the landscape has only grown hotter: opposition is more organized, hearing rooms are packed, and narratives are shifting to include transparency, ownership structures, private equity, and even debates […]
Amid headlines blaming AI for soaring power bills, a Berkeley Lab/Brattle analysis adds needed nuance: large loads can lower average rates where spare capacity exists, while aging infrastructure, wildfire mitigation, storms, and some mandate-driven procurement are major price drivers. Regulators and politicians are responding in real time: Virginia’s statewide races are now openly about who pays for grid growth, utilities are proposing special rate classes for hyperscale users, Michigan’s MPSC is weighing stricter IRP guardrails […]
As local moratoria spread from Georgia to Virginia to the Midwest, a new AP–NORC poll reveals something striking: Americans are now more worried about the environmental impact of AI and data centers than they are about aviation, meat production, or cryptocurrency. This week’s Zoning In tracks a growing disconnect between industry momentum and community confidence. Dozens of projects remain paused or withdrawn amid questions about water, power, and transparency — from Jones County’s 90-day moratorium […]
From Georgia to the Midwest, local governments are drawing hard lines around data center expansion — and this week, the pushback hit a new pitch. DeKalb County, Georgia extended its moratorium through mid-December while unveiling a detailed “tiered” rulebook that classifies projects as minor, major, or campus-scale and requires developers to submit comprehensive plans for noise, water, energy, transmission, and stormwater impacts. Meanwhile, St. Louis County Commissioner Ashley Grimm blasted fellow officials for signing nondisclosure […]
