Artificial intelligence data centres are large computing facilities that store, process and distribute digital data for cloud services, machine learning and internet platforms. In 2025 and 2026, several projects in the United States faced local opposition, court challenges and municipal rejections linked to land use, electricity demand and water consumption.
Data Centre Electricity Use
Data centres are among the fastest-growing electricity users in the digital economy. The International Energy Agency estimated global data centre electricity consumption at 415 terawatt-hours in 2024 and projected it to rise to 945 terawatt-hours by 2030. The same estimate placed data centre electricity demand growth at 17% in 2025, compared with global electricity demand growth of 3%. US data centres consumed 176 terawatt-hours of electricity in 2023. That amount was equivalent to the annual electricity use of about 16 million homes. Projections for 2028 place US data centre consumption in the range of 325 to 580 terawatt-hours, which could account for up to 12% of total US electricity generation.
Local Opposition and Planning Disputes
Festus in Missouri removed four city council members on 13 April 2026 after approval of a $6 billion AI data centre project. A petition was also started to remove the remaining council members and the mayor. In New Brunswick, New Jersey, the city council rejected an AI data centre deal in February 2026 and chose to use a 27,000-square-foot site for a public park. A Virginia appeals court invalidated a rezoning in late March 2026 for Digital Gateway, a planned 22 million square foot data centre complex outside Washington, D.C. The project was linked to community opposition and land-use litigation.
Water Use and Environmental Concerns
Data centres use water for cooling systems, especially in large server farms. Mid-sized facilities can use up to 300,000 gallons of water per day, while large facilities can use up to 5 million gallons daily. These figures are comparable to the daily water use of a small town. In December 2025, more than 230 state and local environmental groups and Senator Bernie Sanders called for a national moratorium on new data centre construction. The concerns cited electricity bills, power outages and water use in vulnerable areas.
Security and Infrastructure Risks
In March 2026, Iranian drones struck Amazon Web Services facilities in the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain. The attack caused physical damage and disrupted cloud services, and it was the first explicit kinetic targeting of commercial hyperscale data centres in a conflict.
Recent Protest Data
A January 2026 assessment recorded 53 active community groups across 17 US states targeting 30 data centre projects in the second quarter of 2025. The same assessment stated that 66% of tracked protested projects were blocked or delayed. Another January 2026 report estimated that opposition had risen by 125% in the second quarter of 2025, with about $98 billion in projects blocked or delayed.
Last Modified: April 22, 2026