AI data centers surge in US countryside

WashingtonFor the vast majority of Americans, artificial intelligence has appeared in their lives in the form of a chatbot. For others, however, it has also materialized in concrete bunkers, full of servers and cables, that they can see from their own windows. When one of these giants appears, in many municipalities the water pressure drops – or the supply fails altogether – and residents begin to notice health problems.

Data centers are the electric heart of the new economic boom the United States is experiencing at the height of AI and are at the center of the technological race with China. They have also become the embodiment of a deep unease that is transversal within the political spectrum and is already surfacing in public debate on the eve of legislative elections. "It is generating a new political division between the haves and the have-nots, which goes beyond partisan positions," explains Saul Levin to ARA, who has created a denunciation project in which he gives voice to people affected by data centers.

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The podcast in which Levin collects testimonies is titled The Hum in allusion to the inaudible hum that servers emit. "The people I've spoken to live thirty minutes or an hour from the facilities, and they all tell you how detrimental they are to their community and how everything is for the benefit of billionaires. Basically, everyone I talk to hates data centers except for those making money from them," he explains. Levin highlights how behind the helplessness caused by the situation, a movement of opposition is being born "across all states".

In May, a survey conducted by Gallup already highlighted how seven out of ten Americans oppose the construction of data centers in their local area and how just over 25% are in favor. Looking at political affiliation, opposition to the facilities is 59% among Democrats, 39% among Republicans, and 48% among independent voters. A poll published this week by Politico also captures how discontent is growing. In January, 28% of Americans opposed the construction of a data center near their homes. Now, in July, the percentage has already grown to 41%.

Nearly half of Americans live near a data center

The animosity towards data centers is advancing at the same pace as these facilities expand in the United States. Across the country, there are already more than 3,000 facilities operating 24 hours a day, seven days a week, according to an analysis by the Pew Research Center, and another 1,500 are already under construction. The same study points out that currently, 38% of Americans live within five miles of at least one data center. If those under construction are also taken into account, the figure rises to 42% of the population.

Behind this boom are the same men who on January 20, 2025 enjoyed a privileged seat during the inauguration of Donald Trump: Elon Musk (X and Tesla), Mark Zuckerberg (Meta), Jeff Bezos (Amazon), Sundar Pichai (Google and Alphabet), and Tim Cook (Apple). Other giants behind this wave of data centers include OpenAI, co-founded by Sam Altman, and Oracle, created by Larry Ellison. Thanks to his alliance with Trump, Ellison has also managed to get the White House to grant him control of TikTok's algorithm in the US.

Although in the race for AI, there is much talk of China's critical minerals and the microchips manufactured in Taiwan as crucial elements, the reality is that they are not the only ones. The water and energy consumed by data centers are an indispensable resource for the functioning of servers. According to a report by the Environmental and Energy Study Institute (EESI), in a single day, large data centers can consume up to 19 million liters of water to prevent computers from overheating. This is equivalent to the water consumption of a population of between 10,000 and 50,000 inhabitants.

An additional cost for the local population

A large part of the data centers being built right now are concentrated in rural areas, where the electrical and hydraulic infrastructure is being overwhelmed. Beyond pollution and noise, one of the major problems is how local residents are bearing the extra cost generated by these facilities on their electricity bills.

In states with a high concentration of data centers, such as Virginia, electricity prices have skyrocketed by up to 267% in the last five years, according to the EESI. Utility companies are passing these increases on to consumer bills to compensate for the additional expenses of rapidly deploying new infrastructure with power lines and transformers that can sustain the demand of these tech hubs. The organization points out that in 2025, dozens of energy companies received requests from data centers to create network connections with a combined power of at least 700 GW, a figure that exceeds the average U.S. electricity demand in 2023 (477 GW).

The local population bears the negative impact while not perceiving any tangible benefit, while large tech companies earn millions of dollars thanks to the valuation of AI and its development. "It's affecting everything: the economy, society, people's lives. Farmland is being ruined, other land is being bought, and this is creating winners and losers: some people working for the companies or in construction are making a lot of money, while others are being harmed," emphasizes Levin.

Although data centers directly impact the cost of living – which will influence voting patterns next November – the debate on regulatory policies is just beginning to emerge in public opinion. Last week, the Democratic governor of New York, Kathy Hochul, made headlines after approving a one-year moratorium on the construction of new facilities in the state. The measure has placed the management of the expansion of these centers at the center of political debate.

So far, few politicians have spoken out. Recently, independent senator Bernie Sanders, one of the most left-wing voices in the U.S., proposed in an article in The New York Times the creation of a sovereign wealth fund to give citizens shared ownership, and therefore control over the expansion of AI and its benefits. He has also called for a nationwide moratorium.

Lobis pro-AI

The US president is not oblivious to the noise beneath his feet, and at the beginning of the year he announced a "Commitment to protect consumers" against these surcharges. However, this is a non-binding plan. On Thursday, at an event at the headquarters of the US Environmental Protection Agency, Trump announced the adherence of about twenty governors and public companies to this pact, which aims to make large technology companies pay for the surcharge caused by data centers.

Despite being a hot topic among Trumpist bases – Steve Bannon has emerged as one of the main opponents of these facilities – Trump speaks very little about it. "Washington is deliberately ignoring it because many are taking money from technology companies," denounces Levin. Beyond the ties that tech billionaires wove with the US president, new lobbies have also appeared.

While local communities try to curb the expansion of data centers, large technology companies have long been playing another game in the corridors of Capitol Hill. Last year, large super-PACS were created focused on watering with millions of dollars those candidates who were favorable to the development of AI, regardless of whether they are Republicans or Democrats. One is Leading the Future, which has capital from one of the co-founders of OpenAI, Greg Brockman; another is Meta California, created by Zuckerberg with the aim of exerting political pressure in California, and then there is Public First Action, in which Anthropic plans to spend 40 million dollars leading up to the midterm elections.