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Governor who touted Texas as AI "epicenter" pauses data center grid connections:
Nowhere is the US data center boom bigger than in Texas. But less than a year after declaring Texas the "epicenter of AI development," Governor Greg Abbott has declared a moratorium on all new power grid connections for data centers—at least until developers provide more information about their projects' potential impacts on the grid and communities.
The Republican governor directed regulators in an August 3 announcement at the Public Utility Commission of Texas and the grid operators at the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) to perform a "comprehensive verification and audit of all data centers advancing through ERCOT's interconnection process." As an independent system operator, ERCOT oversees a power grid that operates separately from the rest of the United States and provides services to most of Texas.
Texas has aggressively courted data center development with its availability of cheap land and relatively abundant energy resources, along with offering state incentives, like tax breaks and fewer regulations. That puts the state on track to surpass Virginia in becoming the largest US data center market.
But the recent AI boom and the accompanying frenzy of data center development threaten to overwhelm the Texas grid on paper, despite the state leading the country in adding new power generation. The ERCOT interconnection queue currently includes more than 1,800 projects representing over 474 gigawatts' worth of requests to connect to the Texas grid—more than five times Texas' record peak electricity demand—and about 90 percent of those power connection requests come from data centers.
"That unprecedented load growth could endanger the reliability and stability of the Texas electric grid," according to the statement from Abbott's office.
[...] The new directive from Abbott requires audits of data center projects that include how much data centers would depend on the ERCOT grid for power, along with obtaining projections of data centers' annual and peak electricity consumption. The directive further requires information on how much individual data center projects depend on state financial assistance, along with details on each data center project's ownership and controlling interests.
Abbott also directed state regulators and grid operators to discover the extent to which data centers' cooling systems and water usage may draw upon local water supplies needed by local communities. However, the governor's directive does not mention the fact that data centers often use much more water through their power generation sources than directly through their cooling systems—a fact highlighted by researchers like Shaolei Ren at the University of California, Riverside.
[...] Abbott's directive also seeks to increase scrutiny of measures that data centers are taking to "reduce impacts on neighboring property owners and communities, including noise mitigation, light controls, setbacks, traffic improvements, emergency response coordination and other community protection measures."
But the directive conspicuously neglects to mention local air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions associated with data centers. Nonprofit newsroom Floodlight has reported that AI companies used a local permit loophole in Texas to install gas-powered turbines and backup diesel generators on site at new data center campuses—all without requiring more extensive environmental reviews or outreach to local communities.
Notably, the Texas pause on data center grid connections does not apply to data center projects that are building their own on-site power generation to get up and running as fast as possible. That "behind-the-meter power" strategy has become increasingly common among tech and AI companies like Meta, Microsoft, Amazon, Oracle, OpenAI, and Anthropic, according to research by market intelligence platform CleanView.
Such behind-the-meter power typically relies on natural gas. But with lengthy order backlogs for combined-cycle gas turbines, CleanView says data center developers are turning to alternative sources, such as "mobile gas generators strapped to semitrucks" and "aeroderivative turbines originally designed for aircraft and warships."
Texas leads all US states in total announced behind-the-meter capacity for data centers by having 40 gigawatts of such announced capacity. That factor is driven by the Texas Permian Basin gas supply and "extensive pipeline infrastructure" along with the "state's permissive regulatory environment," according to CleanView.
Despite the oversight gaps, the Texas moratorium on data center approvals "throws a massive wrench into ERCOT's plans to bring data centers online," according to E&E News. The Texas grid operator has been seeking to connect data center projects to the grid in groups, with notifications for the coveted first group known as "Batch Zero" planned to go out by the end of this week. But ERCOT officials said they will postpone the Batch Zero process while working with state regulators to carry out Abbott's directive.
Abbott's change of tune on AI data centers comes as the incumbent governor has "seen support erode over concerns about data centers and extra-high-voltage transmission lines built in rural areas," E&E News reported. It also pointed to polls showing Texas voters generally opposing data centers in their communities—part of a national trend among Americans—and Democratic challenger Gina Hinojosa running just one percentage point behind Abbott in a recent Fox News poll.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 09, @07:10PM (1 child)
Oh, come on! When people protest data centers, they're almost exclusively talking about hyperscale data centers, which are generally being used to train specific types of AI models. And those AI models are causing job losses. When your initial response is to be willfully obstinate, it's a sign that your position is very weak.
Food is a much more important need than training AI models, and you know it. The AI industry is driven by tech bros who hate America, want to see Americans out of work, and to drive up the costs of basic needs for the American people while putting them out of work. The backlash to the industry wouldn't be nearly as severe if the industry wasn't driven by a bunch of America-hating misanthropes. That's a valid conclusion based on their callous disregard for the impacts their industry and their beloved data centers have on others.
You've made similar arguments many times, including in the recent past. Your immediate defensiveness about this suggests that you're angry because it's uncomfortably close to the truth. Your response only reinforces my position that many of the pro-AI or anti-climate change mitigation posts here are driven by people who have financial stakes in those matters.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday August 09, @11:18PM
Ok, let's look at the US. Peak recent employment was 61.8% at the start of 2020 soon to drop 10% of the population to 51.2% in April 2020 due to covid. It recovered to just over 60% for a few months in early 2022 before declining again. In July 2026, it was just under 59%.
So how can you tell this is due to AI rather than retirement of Boomers and US's bad economic policies since 2020 - Biden and Trump administrations both fail on this. My take is that we have little sign of the job destroying capabilities of AI - especially given that automation in the past has created higher productivity jobs.
Air is more important than food. Do we need to prioritize our air industry over our food industry?
"Defensiveness"? I merely note the dishonesty of that argument. And confirmation bias is what "reinforces" your position.