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Title: As Electric Bills Rise, Evidence Mounts That U.S. Data Centers Share
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Link: https://hardware.slashdot.org/story/25/08/10/...

"Amid rising electric bills, states are under pressure to insulate regular
household and business ratepayers from the costs of feeding Big Tech's energy-
hungry data centers..." reports the Associated Press. "Some critics question
whether states have the spine to take a hard line against tech behemoths like
Microsoft, Google, Amazon and Meta." [T]he Data Center Coalition, which
represents Big Tech firms and data center developers, has said its members
are committed to paying their fair share. But growing evidence suggests that
the electricity bills of some Americans are rising to subsidize the massive
energy needs of Big Tech as the U.S. competes in a race against China for
artificial intelligence superiority. Data and analytics firm Wood Mackenzie
published a report in recent weeks that suggested 20 proposed or effective
specialized rates for data centers in 16 states it studied aren't nearly
enough to cover the cost of a new natural gas power plant. In other words,
unless utilities negotiate higher specialized rates, other ratepayer classes -
 residential, commercial and industrial - are likely paying for data center
power needs. Meanwhile, Monitoring Analytics, the independent market watchdog
for the mid-Atlantic grid, produced research in June showing that 70% - or
$9.3 billion - of last year's increased electricity cost was the result of
data center demand. Last year, five governors led by Pennsylvania's Josh
Shapiro began pushing back against power prices set by the mid-Atlantic grid
operator, PJM Interconnection, after that amount spiked nearly sevenfold.
They warned of customers "paying billions more than is necessary." PJM has
yet to propose ways to guarantee that data centers pay their freight, but
Monitoring Analytics is floating the idea that data centers should be
required to procure their own power. In a filing last month, it said that
would avoid a "massive wealth transfer" from average people to tech
companies. At least a dozen states are eyeing ways to make data centers pay
higher local transmission costs. In Oregon, a data center hot spot, lawmakers
passed legislation in June ordering state utility regulators to develop new -
presumably higher - power rates for data centers. The Oregon Citizens'
Utility Board [a consumer advocacy group] says there is clear evidence that
costs to serve data centers are being spread across all customers - at a time
when some electric bills there are up 50% over the past four years and
utilities are disconnecting more people than ever. "Some data centers could
require more electricity than cities the size of Pittsburgh, Cleveland or New
Orleans," the article points out...

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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