Senate Report Says Data Center Giants Shift Costs to Households, Seek Tax Breaks
A yearlong Senate investigation of Amazon, Google, Meta and Microsoft says data center costs are shifting onto households as firms seek tax breaks and NDAs.
Senators Elizabeth Warren, Chris Van Hollen and Richard Blumenthal have released a 27-page report, Power and Profits, and it is a showstopper. After a nearly yearlong investigation of seven giants (Amazon, Google, Meta, Microsoft, CoreWeave, Digital Realty and Equinix), the Democrats say some firms are misleading the public about what these projects cost and deliver, according to TIME.
The numbers, darlings! None of the seven would agree to pay for new power infrastructure that would not have been needed without their data centers. The report says they commit to paying for infrastructure that solely benefits them; the fight is over shared infrastructure built to accommodate their demand. Amazon, Google, Meta and Microsoft routinely sought NDAs, some from government officials. Microsoft and Amazon say they will stop with local governments. Google and Meta declined to commit.
Then Louisiana. Analysts say Entergy's bid to buy a power plant was driven primarily by Meta's planned $50 billion, 4,500-megawatt data center, with estimates of $8 to $13 more a month for the average customer. Meta disputes that its project is responsible.
The context: in September the House passed the Ratepayer Protection Act 417-3, and the Senate voted 57-43 against advancing it. About half of Americans tell Economist/YouGov that data center construction is bad for the country.
My take? Warren wants a national moratorium until developers cover full costs. Love it or loathe it, the electric bill is now the most political line item in the entire SI boom.
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Sources
Meanwhile at the anchor desk
Some companies told investigators a 100-megawatt site could use as much power as 100,000 homes while employing about 100 permanent workers. None supplied comprehensive quantitative evidence of full-time job creation. Quite a jobs pitch without the job-count receipts.
The prize is the sales-tax exemption on hardware. GPUs are an estimated 39% of spending at an average 1-gigawatt AI facility, so that exemption is worth more than the property-tax breaks that get the headlines.
