Washington, D.C. – Today the national environmental group Food & Water Watch released a comprehensive, deeply researched report that makes a compelling, urgent case for a nationwide moratorium on the construction of new AI-driven data centers. The highly detailed report lays out the wide range of harms and hazards associated with the sudden explosion of the data center industry in America, including: 

• Enormous and unsustainable consumption of power and water resources, already resulting in skyrocketing utility bills for families and small businesses.
• Dangerous new demand for fossil fuels, posing heightened risks of air and water pollution for impacted communities and a grave threat to our global climate.
• A host of other societal threats, from national economic catastrophe, to loss of critical farmland, to unrelenting noise pollution, to threats to children and democracy.

The report, The Urgent Case Against Data Centers, methodically outlines the need for a moratorium on new data center construction nationwide, so that local, state and federal leaders can take the time needed to thoroughly and adequately evaluate these and other inherent harms and threats from this aggressive, profit-driven industry.

Meanwhile, in a letter sent to Governor Hochul and state legislators earlier this week, more than 100 community, environmental and faith organizations from across the state called for the passage of a bill to implement a temporary moratorium on the approval and construction of new data centers in New York. The bill (S.9144/A.10141), recently introduced by Senator Liz Krueger and Assemblymember Anna Kelles, requires a comprehensive assessment of environmental and economic impacts of the industry, as well as the implementation of statewide regulations to sufficiently mitigate such impacts before any new data center could be built.

Currently, data centers in New York are seeking more than 9,000 megawatts of new demand — about 1.5 times the power consumption of every household in the state in 2024. Already, New York experienced a 43 percent increase in residential electricity rates between 2020 and 2025.

“As this report clearly shows, we need a halt to the explosive growth of new data center construction now, because political and community leaders across the country have been caught completely off guard by this aggressive, profit-hungry industry. It has yet to be determined if – not how – the industry can ever operate in a manner that sufficiently protects people and society from the profusion of inherent hazards and harms that data centers bring wherever they appear,” said Wenonah Hauter, founder and executive director of Food & Water Watch. 

“If we really want to protect New Yorkers from skyrocketing energy costs over the next decade, one of the simplest but most important things we can do is hit the pause button on new energy-guzzling data centers. As this new report clearly shows, data centers bring with them a host of negative impacts, from pushing up energy costs to driving fossil fuel consumption to producing headache-inducing noise pollution for miles around. Regulators and lawmakers need time to develop comprehensive policy solutions for smart data center development – that’s why we need a moratorium now,” said State Senator Liz Krueger, Senate sponsor of the New York data center moratorium bill.

“The intent of this legislation is to create a responsible pause, not to stop innovation. Data centers are expanding at a pace that far outstrips our regulatory framework and long-term planning. Before any additional permits are considered for data center development, we need a clear-eyed, comprehensive assessment of their impacts on energy demand, water resources, ratepayers, farmland, and host communities. This bill requires a full environmental and economic review and establishes enforceable standards before any new projects move forward. Innovation should not come at the expense of public health, infrastructure reliability, or the financial stability of everyday New Yorkers. A temporary moratorium ensures future development aligns with the public interest, not simply the speed of private investment. States across the political spectrum are recognizing the need for this pause so regulations and infrastructure planning can catch up with a rapidly expanding industry and minimize long-term impacts on communities and ratepayers,” said Assembly Member Anna Kelles, Assembly sponsor of the New York data center moratorium bill.

“The NY Renews coalition supports a temporary moratorium on the approval and construction of new data centers in the state because we recognize that their unfettered and unregulated growth undermines our climate and environmental justice mandates. While we continue to support local fights, like the efforts of the Tonawanda Seneca Nation to stop a massive data center at STAMP on the border of their reservation territory, which threatens the Nation’s cultural practices and treaty-protected rights, we will work to ensure that all communities have the necessary protections before any proposal comes their way. We urge our lawmakers to take steps to regulate this industry — we’re not there yet. A moratorium is necessary to ensure that data centers don’t raise bills, pollute communities, or undermine environmental justice,” said Stephan Edel, Executive Director of NY Renews.

“The current call for moratoria in building hyperscale data centers throughout the nation is to allow for the development and implementation of sound environmental policy and prudent economic policy. If not, the industry will continue to rush into agreements with local governments to acquire land, water and electricity to meet massive energy needs. These agreements are loaded with ratepayer subsidies, access to precious water sources, and promises to supply energy that feeds into the fossil fuel industry’s narrative that to keep this technology running we have to put a pause on dealing with climate change for now.  Third Act supports a moratoria to afford us necessary time to get it right before irreparable harm is done to the environment and the economy,” said Michael Richardson, Campaigns Director, Third Act.

“We are all on the same grid. When hyperscale data centers move in, they don’t just strain local resources — they hike utility rates for every household on the line. We are already seeing the fallout: across our regional grid, data center demand has triggered an 833% spike in wholesale power costs. In fact, grid operators recently admitted that a staggering 97% of all new electricity demand is coming solely from data centers. This is tech colonization: a massive transfer of land, water, and energy from the working class to a handful of billionaires. In places like Oregon, a single facility guzzled a quarter of the entire city’s water supply. This infrastructure isn’t being built for us; it’s being built to be used on us. NYC-DSA stands with Food & Water Watch to demand that our public resources serve the people, not the speculative profits of Big Tech,” said Katherine Jin, organizer with NYC Democratic Socialist of America.

“Across the country, communities are forced to protect themselves against a rapidly expanding, unchecked data center industry, often with little to no information about the developments proposed in their own backyards,” said Yvonne Taylor, Vice President of Seneca Lake Guardian. “What we do know is that these facilities consume extraordinary amounts of electricity and pose severe risks to our water and air quality. This report sheds a critical light on the scale of this industry’s impacts and gives communities the information they need to demand transparency and strong protections that put public health and clean environments over corporate profit.”

“This new industrial sector is currently operating without any regulatory guardrails and is developing faster than lawmakers can keep up with, and in the absence of regulations, fenceline communities once again are bearing the brunt of the impacts from industry. New York needs to take environmental justice seriously, which means passing laws to regulate industry and developing programs to implement those regulations. None of this can happen at the speed data centers are being developed and built – we need to give lawmakers time to catch up. We strongly urge the swift passage of a two-year moratorium on new data centers to give our representatives the time they need to consult with fenceline communities, technical experts, and other key public health and environmental stakeholders to develop regulations, as opposed to only hearing from industry lobbyists,” said Bridge Rauch, Environmental Justice Organizer, the Clean Air Coalition of WNY.

“The current call for moratoria in building hyperscale data centers throughout the nation is to allow for the development and implementation of sound environmental policy and prudent economic policy. If not, the industry will continue to rush into agreements with local governments to acquire land, water and electricity to meet massive energy needs. These agreements are loaded with ratepayer subsidies, access to precious water sources, and promises to supply energy that feeds into the fossil fuel industry’s narrative that to keep this technology running we have to put a pause on dealing with climate change for now.  Third Act supports a moratoria to afford us necessary time to get it right before irreparable harm is done to the environment and the economy,” said Michael Richardson, Campaigns Director, Third Act.