To advance its dangerous push to expand AI data centers nationwide, Big Tech and its allies have turned to a host of misleading or downright false talking points. 

The truth is, the tech industry’s AI data center boom threatens communities across the country. They guzzle our water, raise our electricity bills, drain our resources, and pollute our air and climate. But the industry’s messaging aims to ease concerns and position data centers as “good” and “necessary.” 

We’re not falling for it. Learn the facts behind eight of Big Tech’s biggest fictions:

FICTION: Data centers are “economic development.”

FACT: Data centers are drains on our communities.

AI data centers consume our energy, our water, and our infrastructure. They don’t bring many jobs. They negotiate lucrative tax breaks to avoid paying their fair share to the community in which they’re built. Any claim that data centers are “economic development” is a hollow corporate talking point.

Some corporations are negotiating “Community Benefit Agreements” with communities, with several state leaders endorsing them. But these agreements are little more than a PR stunt. There’s a massive power imbalance between a small town and a tech giant. Local communities could never expect to get fully compensated for the harm of a new data center. 

FICTION: Data centers provide “job opportunities.”

FACT: Data center jobs are costly and few.

Industry job claims are often overinflated, and the vast majority of jobs generated by an AI data center are temporary construction jobs. They’re also expensive to create. 

In Virginia, the data center capital of the country, Food & Water Watch found that data centers only created one direct, permanent job for every $54 million invested from 2020 through late 2025. That’s 168 times more than the cost to create one permanent non-data center job ($322,000).

Meanwhile, AI threatens to destabilize job markets in entire industries, and tech giants themselves are moving forward with huge layoffs amid AI adoption. Anthropic’s CEO suggested AI could replace 50% of white-collar workers, and OpenAI’s CEO boasted that AI can replace entry-level workers.

FICTION: Closed-loop cooling will solve AI data centers’ water woes.

FACT: Closed-loop cooling is a greenwashing ploy.

The data center industry is increasingly touting the use of so-called “zero water” closed-loop cooling systems. These systems may use less water than traditional systems to cool the computers in data centers, but they’re far from a panacea. 

Crucially, as developers work to build AI data centers in drought-stricken areas, we can’t afford to waste any water on Big Tech’s profit machines.

Moreover, closed-loop systems often consume more energy. If they’re getting that energy from fossil fuels — which the vast majority of data centers do — their water savings at the data center may be offset by the additional water needed to generate electricity.

FICTION: Data centers can just “bring their own power.”

FACT: “Bring Your Own Power” deals won’t lower electricity costs.

Industry boosters and elected officials alike have pushed “Bring Your Own Power” schemes, in which data centers build their own power plants, commandeer a power plant already on the grid, or pay special electricity rates, purportedly to take responsibility for their outsized power use. But all these arrangements fail to address the root cause of data centers’ energy problems, and don’t guarantee lower electricity bills for ratepayers.

AI data centers are simply demanding too much energy, too fast. This is leading to a whole host of issues that “Bring Your Own Power” won’t solve: bottlenecks in supply chains that raise prices for everyone, rushing to use available dirty energy like diesel and gas, and the need to build (and fund) more transmission infrastructure.

FICTION: We can power all these data centers with renewables.

FACT: Data centers are a distraction from our urgently needed green transition.

Given AI data centers’ wild power needs, powering them entirely with renewables is a pie-in-the-sky idea. Continuously powering a single 1GW data center would require nearly 20,000 acres of solar panels or 185,000 acres of onshore wind power. We can’t afford to waste the time or resources to build renewables for Big Tech’s profit. 

Already, data center growth is outstripping available renewable energy supply. It’s drawing urgently needed renewables away from existing technologies and resources. We need to focus our renewable energy efforts toward those who need it most. Not toward lining Big Tech’s pockets.

FICTION: AI will help us save the climate.

FACT: Generative AI is rarely used to address climate change.

Tech leaders such as Microsoft and Google have claimed that AI will help us save climate change, creating innovative solutions like a magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat. But the truth is, claims of AI’s usefulness to the climate fight are vastly overstated. 

As a February 2026 report explains, “virtually all stated climate benefits relate to ‘traditional’ AI” — not generative tools like chatbots and image generators that are driving the data center industry’s recent growth. Moreover, claimed benefits are seldom based on research or real-world uses. 

FICTION: We need AI data centers to “Beat China.”

FACT: Baseless fearmongering is enabling Big Tech profits.

Talks of an “AI race” between the United States and China are dominating headlines and discourse. But this idea isn’t grounded in reality. The researchers, companies, and governments behind Chinese and U.S. AI development are pursuing completely different goals.

While U.S. tech giants barrel toward a “superintelligence” while raking in mind-boggling profits, Chinese AI development is focused on embedding AI into products and services across the economy. In other words, it’s ChatGPT vs. robots.

But the myth of an “AI race with China” is a convenient lie for Big Tech and its political protectors, designed to insulate the industry from criticism and regulation.

FICTION: Data centers are inevitable.

FACT: Communities nationwide are stopping AI data centers!

We face powerful opponents: billion-dollar mega-corporations employing their wealth and influence to try and steamroll over our communities and sway our leaders. But tech giants, developers, and their allies benefit from the belief that the AI data center boom is “inevitable.” In fact, they’re betting on it. 

Nevertheless, over the last year, we’ve seen that data centers are far from a done deal. When communities come out in force to speak out, stand up to Big Tech, and hold their elected officials accountable, they win. 

Across the country, hundreds of communities have passed local measures to block data center development. In July, New York became the first state in the country to enact a statewide moratorium on data centers. And support is growing for federal legislation to stop all new data centers, nationwide.

Together, we can shape the future of our technology, our environment, and our communities.