The explosive growth of data centers around the country — driven in large part by the burgeoning use of artificial intelligence — could come at a “staggering” cost for average residents with skyrocketing electricity bills.
A new report from Harvard’s Electricity Law Initiative says unless something changes, all U.S. consumers will pay billions of dollars to build new power plants to serve Big Tech.
Data centers are forecast to account for up to 12% of all U.S. electricity demand by 2028. They currently use about 4% of all electricity.
Historically, costs for new power plants, powerlines and other infrastructure is paid for by all customers under the belief that everyone benefits from those investments.
“But the staggering power demands of data centers defy this assumption,” the report argues.
“We’re all paying for the energy costs of the world’s wealthiest corporations,” said report author Ari Peskoe, director of the initiative at the Harvard Law School Environmental and Energy Law Program. He worked with co-author Eliza Martin to produce the report, “Extracting Profits from the Public: How Utility Ratepayers are Paying for Big Tech’s Power.”
The Data Center Coalition, which advocates for the industry, did not respond to a request for comment. A spokesperson for Dominion, which serves one of the nation’s largest data center loads in Virginia, said establishing rates in the state is an “open and transparent” process.
Aaron Mitchell, vice president of pricing and planning at Georgia Power, testified to a Georgia legislative committee that adding 3,300 megawatts (MW) of new generation for data centers will actually reduce customers’ bills. That’s enough electricity to power roughly three million homes.
“The more that we are able to serve, the more that we can provide benefits to existing customers, by virtue of those new customers coming online and paying their fair share of the costs that we incur to serve those customers,” Mitchell said.