New York has enacted a one-year moratorium on new hyperscale data center permits to assess grid, water, ratepayer, and community impacts.
Data Center Moratorium Push
contrarian
regulatory
supply constraint
Federal organizing is replacing local zoning fights as physical resource limits, highlighted by BlackRock's warnings about power and land scarcity, become the main bottleneck for AI expansion. This policy movement seeks to impose pauses or strict limits on new facility construction to manage escalating demand on power and cooling systems across all scales of compute infrastructure.
opinion
New York has become the first state to halt data center construction, citing concerns that may impact the industry's expansion and raise questions about future development.
New York has paused permits for new data centers exceeding 50 MW while authorities develop regulations addressing grid impact, water consumption, and community concerns.
New York State has enacted a one-year moratorium on new data center developments via an executive order from Governor Hochul, pausing state-level growth.
New York's Governor has enacted a statewide moratorium on data center development, effectively halting projects valued at approximately $10 billion.
The Scottish National Party (SNP) is supporting a national data center moratorium, citing concerns over the environmental impact of these facilities.
A crucial United States data center law is set to expire without a replacement, raising concerns about the future regulatory landscape for data centers.
Fourteen states and numerous local jurisdictions are considering implementing bans on data centers.
The New York state legislature has passed a bill for a data center moratorium, which, if approved by Governor Hochul, would make New York the first state in the US to implement such a statewide measure.
A Michigan senator has proposed a one-year statewide moratorium on the construction of new data centers, mirroring a previous proposal.
In January 2026, over 230 US-based advocacy groups urged Congress to implement a moratorium on data center construction until stringent regulations are established, signaling a shift from local disputes to a national movement against data center development.
The Governor of Maine has vetoed a bill that proposed a statewide data center moratorium, maintaining support for a temporary pause on such developments.
Local authorities in the Raleigh-Durham region are considering implementing moratoriums on further data center construction.
Residents in Ohio are pushing for legislation to prohibit the construction of server farms that exceed a power capacity of 25 megawatts, reflecting a growing local resistance movement against large-scale data center developments across the nation.
A municipality in Massachusetts has enacted a temporary one-year prohibition on the development and operation of new data center facilities.
Over 230 organizations across the United States have signed a letter advocating for an immediate halt to new data center construction, citing significant environmental and social risks associated with the current building surge.
European authorities are taking a more aggressive regulatory stance compared to the United States in attempting to manage and control the growth of data center development.
According to the campaign group Foxglove, proposed data center projects in Scotland collectively require an estimated 3 GW of power, which equates to approximately 75 percent of the country's current peak electricity demand.
BlackRock's 2026 Investment Outlook identifies that the ambitious artificial intelligence objectives planned for the US and Europe are critically threatened by fundamental limitations in available land and necessary energy capacity.