Data center moratoriums and zoning laws by state
AI Laws USA tracks 783 U.S. AI rules on data-center siting and energy across federal, state, county, and city government. Each entry links to its official source.
Federal data-center siting and energy rules (11)
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In effect
TVA data center capacity commitment charge (2026)
Tennessee Valley Authority · Effective October 1, 2026 · Tenn. Valley Auth. Bd. of Dirs. — Data Center Capacity Commitment Charge (approved Aug. 20, 2026; eff. Oct. 1, 2026)
The Tennessee Valley Authority's Board of Directors approved a separate, higher wholesale rate for data centers on August 20, 2026, effective October 1. New or expanding data center loads above 5 megawatts now fall under a Capacity Commitment Charge attached to TVA's data center rate schedules, designed to recover the incremental capacity costs those customers impose on the system. The headline figures are substantial: upfront capacity commitment charges of roughly $1.5 million per megawatt, payable over three to five years, and an all-in average billing increase for data center customers of about 10%, phased in across three consecutive fiscal years. The stated purpose is to keep residential rates low while still serving growing data center demand. TVA matters here out of proportion to a single utility. It is a federal corporate agency supplying power across seven states, so this is not a state rate case but a regional cost-allocation decision reaching a large share of the Southeast — and TVA is among the first large US utilities to adopt a tariff aimed specifically at AI-driven load. Where most 2026 measures in this dataset restrict where data centers may be built, this one changes what they pay to run.
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In effect
FERC Large-Load Interconnection Orders (RM26-4)
United States · Effective June 18, 2026 · FPA § 206 show-cause orders, FERC Docket Nos. EL26-67 through EL26-72 (June 18, 2026), advancing ANOPR Docket No. RM26-4-000
On June 18, 2026, FERC issued tailored show-cause orders under Section 206 of the Federal Power Act to the six major U.S. regional grid operators (PJM, MISO, SPP, CAISO, ISO-NE, and NYISO), directing each to either justify its existing large-load interconnection tariff as just and reasonable or file tariff revisions within 60 days. The orders target the surge in demand from AI data centers and large industrial loads, requiring reforms to study processes, cost transparency to prevent cost-shifting onto ordinary ratepayers, co-location and behind-the-meter accommodation, and new services for flexible large loads. FERC left retail cost-shifting protection to state regulators; reforms apply prospectively and do not disrupt existing deals.
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Blocked / in litigation
NAACP v. xAI (Colossus 2 Air Pollution)
N.D. Miss. · Effective April 14, 2026 · NAACP et al. v. xAI Corp. et al., No. 3:26-cv-00074-MPM-JMV (N.D. Miss., filed April 14, 2026)
The NAACP and local organizations sued xAI and its affiliate MZX Tech in April 2026, alleging 27 natural gas turbines at xAI's Colossus 2 data center in Southaven, Mississippi were operated without required air permits, harming predominantly Black residents near the facility. In June 2026, the Trump DOJ moved to intervene and dismiss the case, arguing the lawsuit would 'hamper America's AI innovation' — marking the first time DOJ used a motion to dismiss a citizen Clean Air Act suit on AI-policy grounds.
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In effect
DHS AI Critical Infra Framework
United States · Effective November 14, 2024 · DHS Framework (Nov. 14, 2024)
DHS released a voluntary framework that lays out the responsibilities of cloud providers, AI developers, AI deployers, critical-infrastructure owners, and civil society for the safe and secure use of AI in U.S. critical infrastructure sectors — including grid, water, financial services, and healthcare.
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In effect
DOE AI Energy Framework
United States · Effective April 29, 2024 · DOE AI for Energy Report (Apr. 29, 2024)
DOE's AI for Energy report sets federal expectations for how utilities, grid operators, and large compute customers use AI for grid operations, demand forecasting, and energy-resource planning — including data centers that strain regional grids.
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Enacted (not yet in effect)
FERC order directing PJM and other grid operators to reform
United States · FERC order directing PJM and other grid operators to reform tariffs on large-load (data center) transmission cost allocation (Docket RM26-4-000)
FERC ordered PJM and other regional grid operators to revise or defend their tariffs within 60 days to prevent existing ratepayers from being unlawfully charged for transmission upgrades required to serve large new loads such as AI data centers.
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Blocked / in litigation
Newsom v. ADS/Amazon (Louisa County VA data center nuisance)
United States · Newsom v. ADS, W.D. Va. (Charlottesville Div.) — motion to dismiss denied early July 2026; preliminary-injunction hearing 2026-08-19
A Louisa County, Virginia homeowner sued an Amazon Web Services affiliate (ADS) over a nearby data center construction project, alleging brown tap water, dust, and loud noise since construction began in March 2025. A federal judge denied Amazon's motion to dismiss in early July 2026, letting the private nuisance claim proceed. The plaintiff is seeking a preliminary injunction to force changes to construction practices, not to halt construction entirely; a hearing is set for August 19, 2026.
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Proposed / pending
Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act of 2026 (data center ratepayer section)
United States · Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act of 2026, 119th Cong. (Senate, introduced Sept. 30, 2026)
A bipartisan Senate permitting bill would speed federal environmental reviews for energy and infrastructure projects and also require large data centers to pay the full extra cost utilities incur to serve them. Under its data center section, none of those costs could be shifted onto other customers, and the data center would keep paying them even if it leaves early. It is a proposal, not law.
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Proposed / pending
H.R. 9340 Ratepayer Protection Act (House-passed 417-3; blocked in Senate)
United States · Ratepayer Protection Act, H.R. 9340, 119th Cong. (2026) (passed House Sept. 16, 2026; H. Rept. 119-814); Senate companion S. 5028 (Husted)
The Ratepayer Protection Act (H.R. 9340) is the first bill Congress has advanced that directly addresses the economic impact of the data center boom, and as of late September 2026 IT IS NOT LAW. THE HOUSE PASSED IT 417-3 on September 16, 2026, under SUSPENSION OF THE RULES — a fast-track procedure normally reserved for non-controversial measures, requiring a two-thirds majority. WHAT IT ACTUALLY DOES IS NARROWER THAN THE MARGIN SUGGESTS. It amends the Public Utility Regulatory Policies Act of 1978 (PURPA) to add a federal standard that states must CONSIDER but need not adopt: rates for large-load customers — data centers with 100 megawatts or more of peak demand at a single site or campus — would recover the full incremental cost of any generation, transmission or distribution upgrade needed to serve them, including if the customer later walks away, and utilities would collect financial assurances before building those upgrades. State regulators must start considering it within one year and decide within two years, and they may decide NO. On September 17, Sen. JON HUSTED (R-Ohio) sought UNANIMOUS CONSENT to pass the bill and Sen. MARTIN HEINRICH (D-New Mexico), ranking member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, OBJECTED. On September 24 the bill was placed directly on the Senate calendar, where it awaits floor action; the Senate companion, S. 5028, sits in committee.
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Blocked / in litigation
Data center noise litigation wave and the dBA measurement gap (2026)
United States · Data center noise litigation wave, 2026 — at least six nuisance and negligence actions across six states
At least SIX lawsuits were filed during 2026 against data center operators over noise, in Mount Pleasant Wisconsin, Southaven Mississippi, Vineland New Jersey, Dowagiac Michigan, North Tonawanda New York and Hood County Texas. Residents near Microsoft's Mount Pleasant facility brought a federal class action in June 2026; residents near xAI's Southaven facility, represented by Weitz & Luxenberg, sued the same month over noise, vibration and air pollution from the gas turbines powering the site. The claims rest on NUISANCE AND NEGLIGENCE — old, well-established doctrines. As Wilmer Hale observed, what is new is not the legal theory but the defendant: data center operators had not previously been the target of this kind of suit. Microsoft's complaint alleges the company could have used adequate soundproofing, acoustic barriers, low-noise cooling systems and proper monitoring and prevention plans. But the most important fact in this entry is technical, and it has consequences for a great many other entries in this dataset. The Mount Pleasant plaintiffs allege the facility produces a LOW-FREQUENCY HUM THAT STANDARD dBA MONITORS CANNOT DETECT. dBA is A-weighted decibel measurement, which deliberately discounts low frequencies because human hearing is less sensitive to them at conversational levels. Almost every municipal noise ordinance is written in dBA. So a jurisdiction can set a strict-sounding decibel limit, measure compliance honestly, and find the facility passes — while residents a quarter mile away cannot sleep. That is the regulatory gap these plaintiffs are suing into. Any jurisdiction relying on a dBA cap to control data center noise should assume it does not reach the sound people are actually complaining about.
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Blocked / in litigation
Raeden v. Gibraltar MI data center moratorium challenge (2026)
United States · Raeden Acquisitions and Cal Realty v. City of Gibraltar, Mich. — federal challenge to a one-year data center moratorium (2026)
Raeden Acquisitions and Cal Realty have filed a FEDERAL lawsuit against the City of Gibraltar, Michigan, claiming that the city's one-year data center moratorium UNLAWFULLY STOPPED their application for a proposed 100-MEGAWATT data center from moving forward. This is the second developer challenge to a municipal data center moratorium indexed in this dataset, after the New Jersey cluster, and it matters because of what the developer says it wants. Raeden President and co-founder Jason Green said the lawsuit is NOT about bypassing the city's review process — it is about GETTING THAT PROCESS MOVING AGAIN and ensuring the application is reviewed UNDER GIBRALTAR'S EXISTING CODE. That framing is the sharpest statement in this dataset of what a moratorium actually does to a pending applicant, and of the legal theory most likely to defeat one. A developer who filed before the pause was adopted has a strong argument that its application vests under the rules in force when it was submitted, and that a municipality cannot change the rules underneath a complete application. The same vesting principle appears repeatedly here from the municipal side: Salem Oregon's moratorium may not reach an application filed days before the vote, Rockford Illinois' does not reach land under a pre-existing annexation agreement, and Cle Elum Washington's may not override a 2002 development agreement. Raeden is asserting that principle affirmatively, in federal court. Nothing has been decided.
State data-center siting and energy rules (112)
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Enacted (not yet in effect)
California AB 2469 data center water disclosure before permits (2026)
California · Effective January 1, 2027 · Cal. AB 2469 (2026), Ch. 436, Stats. 2026 (Gov. Code § 65964.7)
AB 2469 bars any California city or county — including charter cities — from approving a permit that would allow a data center to be built, or expanded in a way that raises its peak water use, unless the developer first provides a water supply assessment, projected water use and efficiency measures, workforce disclosures, and (starting in 2028) a drought 'water scarcity plan'. The developer must also pay the full cost of any water infrastructure needed to serve the project. Governor Newsom signed it on September 21, 2026. A law-firm alert says the package primarily takes effect January 1, 2027.
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In effect
Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes (OK) 3-year data center moratorium
Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes (OK) · Effective October 3, 2026 · Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribal Council vote, three-year data center moratorium on tribal lands (Oct. 3, 2026)
Citizens of the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes in Oklahoma voted at their annual Tribal Council meeting to bar data center construction on tribal lands for three years. Members cited water use, environmental effects, uncertain economic benefits and a lack of transparency about possible projects. Governor Reggie Wassana said no data center agreement had been signed and that he respected the council's decision.
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In effect
Texas Abbott directive: TCEQ data center permit pause (2026)
Texas · Effective September 21, 2026 · Letter of Gov. Greg Abbott to TCEQ Executive Director Kelly Keel, Sept. 21, 2026 (data center permit pause)
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott ordered the state's environmental agency, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, to stop issuing permits sought by data centers. The September 21, 2026 letter says no state agency should move forward with data center approvals until the grid operator ERCOT, the Public Utility Commission and the Water Development Board finish gathering information in their data center audits. TCEQ must pause all data-center-related permits until ERCOT completes its review and report back to the governor by October 19, 2026. The letter also says Abbott will ask the Legislature to eliminate financial incentives for data centers.
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In effect
Texas TWDB data center water reporting penalties (2026)
Texas · Effective September 14, 2026 · Tex. Governor's Directive to the Tex. Water Dev. Bd. (Sept. 14, 2026)
Governor Greg Abbott directed the Texas Water Development Board on September 14, 2026 to penalize data centers that do not report their water usage. The reason is a compliance failure rather than a policy gap: over the past three years, as few as 28% of data centers responded to the state's mandated water usage survey. A reporting requirement that three-quarters of its subjects ignore is not a reporting requirement, and this directive supplies the consequences that were missing. Non-compliance can carry criminal consequences and can make a data center ineligible for water permits, amendments or renewals under Chapter 11 of the Texas Water Code. Abbott instructed the Board to refer violations to the appropriate county or district attorney, and to notify the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality about potential permit disqualification. He also directed the Board to coordinate with the Public Utility Commission of Texas, the state's water utilities and ERCOT on the separate data center audit he ordered in August — which requires projects moving through ERCOT's interconnection queue to verify their water consumption, water sources and cooling technologies before proceeding, with non-compliant projects denied a grid connection. The Board must report back on enforcement by October 14, 2026.
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In effect
Hualapai Tribe (AZ) hyperscale data center moratorium (2026)
Hualapai Tribe (AZ) · Effective September 14, 2026 · Hualapai Tribal Council resolution (approx. September 2026; prior opposition resolution approx. August 20, 2026)
The Hualapai Tribal Council in northern Arizona enacted a moratorium on hyperscale data center development within the Hualapai Reservation in September 2026, building on an opposition resolution passed approximately August 20, 2026. The Hualapai Nation controls nearly one million acres and shares a 108-mile border with the Colorado River. The Tribal Council stated that hyperscale data centers — which power AI and can consume hundreds of millions of gallons of water annually — pose 'a direct and severe threat to the tribe's sacred water, lands, environment and way of life.' The moratorium asserts that no outside entity or private developer may use, damage, or compromise tribal resources without the tribe's free, prior, and informed consent. Chairman Duane Clarke stated: 'Moving forward, we will always protect our air. We will always protect our land, and we will always protect our water.' The Colorado River Basin is facing critical water shortages, which the Tribal Council cited as a primary driver of the action.
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In effect
Massachusetts EO 658 responsible data center development (2026)
Massachusetts · Effective September 8, 2026 · Mass. Exec. Order No. 658 (Sept. 8, 2026)
Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey signed Executive Order No. 658 on September 8, 2026, titled Establishing Requirements for Responsible Data Center Development and Operations in Massachusetts to Protect and Support Ratepayers, Communities, and the Environment. It is the most comprehensive single data center instrument in this dataset, because it combines four mechanisms that other states adopted separately. First, any data center with peak demand above 25 megawatts must meet 100% of its electricity demand with clean energy. Second, developers must obtain local approval before they can seek state construction permits — the same inversion Pennsylvania adopted three weeks earlier, and for the same reason: it stops a developer arriving at a town already holding state authorisations. Third, applicants must demonstrate conformance with state standards on air quality and public health, water use and community engagement, and must submit a community benefits agreement with key stakeholders. Fourth, and the part that gives the clean energy requirement teeth, a developer who does not procure enough incremental clean electricity to cover annual consumption must make an alternative compliance payment, and those funds are credited to a Ratepayer Protection Fund that offsets electricity supply costs for all ratepayers. Compliance with the clean energy requirement can be met by generating onsite, funding construction of nearby new generation, or paying into that fund. The Department of Environmental Protection must stand up the payment mechanism by the end of 2026.
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In effect
New Jersey S3379/A4096 data center transparency (2026)
New Jersey · Effective August 27, 2026 · P.L.2026, c.75 (N.J. S. 3379 / A. 4096, 2026)
New Jersey Governor Mikie Sherrill signed S3379/A4096 on August 27, 2026 (P.L.2026, c.75), requiring data centers in the state to report their energy and water use to the Board of Public Utilities twice a year. Reports cover total energy use (including for cooling), IT-equipment energy use, the serving utility and service agreements, on-site and backup power supplies and their permits, total and peak daily water use, and water sources. The Board must publish the reports online within 30 days. Data centers that receive state financial incentives must also report efficiency and sustainability metrics, which the Board keeps confidential except in anonymized, aggregated form. Reporting runs for three years from each data center's first report, after which the Board decides whether to make it permanent. The law took effect immediately. The Governor presented the signing as delivering all four pillars of her May 2026 data center plan: data centers paying their fair share for energy and the grid (July 2026 laws requiring them to bring their own clean energy and creating a separate rate class), transparency about energy and water use (this law), meaningful community investments, and good union jobs during construction. The same day she announced Department of Community Affairs guidance (sent to towns August 25) to help municipalities negotiate community benefits agreements with developers, backed by technical assistance teams at the Economic Development Authority, the Board of Public Utilities and the Department of Environmental Protection.
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In effect
Delaware HB 233 large-load rate class (2026)
Delaware · Effective August 26, 2026 · Del. H.S. 1 for H.B. 233, 153rd Gen. Assemb., 85 Del. Laws c. 440 (2026)
Delaware House Bill 233 creates a separate utility rate class for large energy-use facilities such as data centers, and requires them to pay the full cost of the infrastructure upgrades they make necessary rather than spreading those costs across residential and small-business customers. This is the core cost-allocation move: once a hyperscale customer sits in its own rate class, the arithmetic that would otherwise socialise its grid costs no longer applies to it. Governor Matt Meyer signed it on August 26, 2026 as part of a four-bill Energy Consumer Protection package, alongside HB 445's clean-generation requirement, HB 310's removal of tax credits for these facilities, and SB 326's limits on what Delmarva Power can recover from ratepayers. All four took effect immediately. Delaware's approach is notable for treating the problem as four separate levers pulled at once — cost class, power supply, tax treatment and utility capital recovery — rather than a single omnibus statute.
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In effect
Delaware HB 445 bring-your-own-generation mandate (2026)
Delaware · Effective August 26, 2026 · Del. H.B. 445, 153rd Gen. Assemb. (2026)
Delaware House Bill 445 requires large energy-use facilities to produce or secure 100 percent of the power they need, including a share of clean or renewable energy, so they do not strain the public grid. The Sierra Club called it a first-of-its-kind clean energy mandate for hyperscale data centers, and the distinguishing feature is that it does not merely charge large users more for grid power — it requires them to bring their own. That changes the question from who pays for new generation to who builds it. A facility cannot satisfy the requirement by accepting a higher tariff; it has to arrange supply. Combined with HB 233, which puts large users in their own rate class and makes them pay the full cost of infrastructure upgrades, Delaware has closed both the cost-shifting route and the capacity-strain route in the same package. Governor Matt Meyer signed it on August 26, 2026 with three companion bills, all effective immediately.
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In effect
Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe (NV) permanent data center moratorium (2026)
Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe (NV) · Effective August 21, 2026 · Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribal Council resolution (August 21, 2026); reported KUNR Sep 2, 2026
The Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribal Council passed a permanent moratorium on data center development on Pyramid Lake Paiute tribal homelands on August 21, 2026. Tribal Chairman Steven Wadsworth cited the tribe's decades-long fight for water sovereignty to protect endangered species — including the cui-ui sucker fish and the Lahontan cutthroat trout, found only in Pyramid Lake — and stated that tribal lands simply lack the water or power-grid infrastructure that large-scale data centers require. Autumn Harry, a Pyramid Lake Paiute tribal member and co-founder of the Water Over Data Alliance, has been an active advocate for educating indigenous communities about data centers as 'a form of land theft and water theft.' The Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe's reservation spans approximately 475,000 acres in Washoe and Storey Counties, Nevada, centered on Pyramid Lake — a sacred site and one of the largest natural lakes in the Great Basin. The moratorium is permanent (not time-limited), placing it among the strongest tribal land-use restrictions enacted against data centers in 2026.
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In effect
Pennsylvania EO 2026-05 data center restrictions (2026)
Pennsylvania · Effective August 18, 2026 · Pa. Exec. Order 2026-05 (Aug. 18, 2026)
Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro signed Executive Order 2026-05 on August 18, 2026, sharply restricting data center development in the state. The order conditions state environmental permitting on two things a developer previously did not need. First, the Department of Environmental Protection may only review a permit application if the developer has made a legally binding commitment to meet the Governor's Responsible Infrastructure Development requirements — the GRID Requirements — which impose limits on electricity and water usage. Second, and more unusual, the developer must already have local approval before the state will look at the application. That inverts the normal sequence, in which a developer can arrive at a township holding state permits and considerable momentum; here the community goes first. The order also removes all AI data center proposals from Pennsylvania's Fast Track permitting process, and prohibits the use of nondisclosure agreements for data center projects — directly addressing the pattern where municipalities negotiate with developers under NDAs and residents learn the details only after decisions are made. The reversal is striking. Shapiro had been an early champion of data center development, including a $20 billion Amazon commitment to build at least two facilities in Bucks and Luzerne Counties. He said he had 'no other choice than but to take this executive action to protect the good people of Pennsylvania from these predatory developers.'
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In effect
Fort Peck Tribes (MT) — Data Center Discussion Ban
Fort Peck Assiniboine and Sioux Tribes · Effective August 10, 2026 · Fort Peck Assiniboine and Sioux Tribal Executive Board Resolution (August 10, 2026), barring data center discussions on the Fort Peck Reservation
The Fort Peck Tribal Executive Board of the Fort Peck Assiniboine and Sioux Tribes — located in northeast Montana — voted at its August 10, 2026 regular meeting to bar all future discussions and proposals for data center development on the Fort Peck Reservation. The resolution bans 'all future discussions and/or proposals pertaining to individuals or entities that would potentially develop data centers on the Fort Peck Reservation' due to 'the threat to our environment and members of our tribe with irreversible impacts.' Tribal Chairman Floyd Azure explained that the board had been approached by three different data center companies in the prior year, none of whom could explain to tribal leadership how the development would benefit the tribe. The Fort Peck Reservation encompasses about 2 million acres in the extreme northeastern corner of Montana, home to the Assiniboine and Sioux peoples. The ban mirrors actions by the Seminole Nation of Oklahoma (March 2026), Sault Ste. Marie Tribe of Chippewa Indians (April 2026), and Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians (May 2026) — all of which banned data center development on tribal lands.
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In effect
Cherokee Nation hyperscale data center ban (2026)
Cherokee Nation (OK) · Effective August 10, 2026 · Cherokee Nation Data Center Task Force Report (Aug. 5, 2026); Principal Chief directive (approx. Aug. 10, 2026)
The Cherokee Nation — the largest federally recognized tribe in the United States, with more than 475,000 citizens — banned hyperscale data center development on tribally owned and trust lands in August 2026, following a Data Center Task Force Report released August 5, 2026. The task force surveyed 1,593 Cherokee Nation citizens and found approximately 64% opposed hyperscale construction within the reservation, with 14% in favor and 22% unsure. The task force defined hyperscale data centers as facilities often spanning more than 10,000 square feet and requiring more than 100 megawatts of power. The report cited concerns about energy use, water consumption, air quality, noise, light pollution, and cultural resource protection. For land within the Cherokee Nation Reservation that is not tribally owned or held in trust, the Nation announced it will not consider supporting a hyperscale data center project unless developers consult with the tribe early, address cultural and natural resource concerns, and include meaningful community input.
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In effect
Cherokee Nation (OK) hyperscale data center ban
Cherokee Nation (OK) · Effective August 5, 2026 · Cherokee Nation Principal Chief's Policy Announcement — Hyperscale Data Center Ban on Tribally Owned and Trust Lands (August 5, 2026); backstory: EO 2026-02-CTH (Feb. 24, 2026)
On August 5, 2026, Principal Chief Chuck Hoskin Jr. announced that the Cherokee Nation will ban hyperscale data centers on all tribally owned and trust lands. The policy follows a task force report citing significant concerns about energy and water consumption, air quality, noise and light pollution, infrastructure strain, and the protection of cultural resources. Community surveys found a large majority of Cherokee citizens do not support hyperscale data center construction within the reservation. For land within the reservation that is not tribally owned or in trust, the Nation will not support data center development unless developers engage in robust early consultation. The task force — established by Executive Order 2026-02-CTH (Feb. 24, 2026) — recommended creating a permanent advisory committee to evaluate future proposals. The Cherokee Nation is the largest tribe in the United States by citizenship.
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In effect
Nebraska LB 1261 behind-the-meter generation (2026)
Nebraska · Effective July 17, 2026 · Neb. L.B. 1261 (2026)
Nebraska Legislative Bill 1261 requires large energy users to generate their own electricity behind the meter, so that increased power demand is not paid for by Nebraska ratepayers. Governor Jim Pillen signed it in June 2026 and his office described it as landmark behind-the-meter legislation aimed at preserving the state's existing energy production. Nebraska is unusual in that its electricity is entirely publicly owned — it is the only all-public-power state in the country — which makes the cost-shifting question sharper than elsewhere: there are no shareholders to absorb a mismatch, so any unfunded load lands directly on other public power customers. LB 1261 sits alongside Governor Pillen's July 20, 2026 executive order suspending state tax incentives for large-scale data centers and creating a resource-protection task force, and the two together are Nebraska's answer to hyperscale demand: bring your own generation, and do not expect a subsidy.
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In effect
EBCI Ord. 158 (Data Center Moratorium)
Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians · Effective May 7, 2026 · EBCI Ordinance No. 158, Cherokee Code ch. 47E (May 7, 2026)
Indefinite moratorium on data center development on the Qualla Boundary. Dinilawigi (Tribal Council) voted 11-0 to amend the Cherokee Code Chapter 47E, finding that high-impact digital infrastructure 'presents a clear and present danger to the lands and people' of the EBCI.
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In effect
Sault Tribe (MI) AI Data Center Moratorium
Sault Ste. Marie Tribe of Chippewa Indians · Effective April 7, 2026 · Sault Ste. Marie Tribe of Chippewa Indians Board Resolution (Apr. 7, 2026)
Sault Tribe Board of Directors voted unanimously to halt any AI data center development on tribal lands indefinitely, citing strain on local resources and uncertain economic benefit. Came after dozens of community members spoke at public comment.
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In effect
Seminole Nation (OK) Data Center / GenAI Moratorium
Seminole Nation of Oklahoma · Effective March 7, 2026 · Seminole Nation of Oklahoma Tribal Council Resolution (Mar. 7, 2026)
First tribal council in the United States to fully bar inquiries, discussions, and development of any data center or generative AI hyperscale infrastructure within Seminole Nation territory. Unanimous (24-0) vote citing water-contamination and sovereignty concerns.
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In effect
Ohio PUCO data center energy service tariff, 85% minimum take (2025)
Ohio · Effective July 23, 2025 · Ohio — PUCO-approved AEP Ohio data center energy service tariff (July 2025), O.R.C. § 4909.18; 85% minimum subscribed-usage payment, 25 MW threshold, up to 12 years
In July 2025 the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio approved what a legal survey describes as 'a landmark tariff structure' for data center electricity service. Its core requirement is a MINIMUM TAKE: new data center customers must PAY FOR AT LEAST 85% OF THEIR SUBSCRIBED ELECTRICITY USAGE, REGARDLESS OF ACTUAL CONSUMPTION, for UP TO 12 YEARS. Understanding why that is a consumer protection requires seeing the problem it solves. When a data center asks a utility for hundreds of megawatts, the utility must plan, and often build, generation and transmission to serve it. Those costs are recovered from the whole ratepayer base over decades. If the data center then uses far less than it subscribed for — because the project shrank, the AI buildout slowed, or it was only ever speculative interest at several sites at once — the infrastructure still exists and everyone else pays for it. A minimum-take provision moves that risk onto the party that caused it. Subscribe for 500 megawatts and you pay for at least 425, whether you use it or not. It also does something subtler and arguably more valuable: it disciplines the forecast. A developer shopping the same nominal load around five utilities has every reason to overstate demand when subscription is free and no reason to do so when 85% of it is a binding financial commitment. Much of the grid-planning anxiety recorded throughout this dataset — PJM's 2030 reliability warnings, the substation-capacity constraints Eureka's planners described, the ratepayer bills in Tennessee, Oklahoma, New Jersey and Arizona — rests on load forecasts that may be inflated by exactly this dynamic. Ohio's tariff is the mechanism most directly aimed at it, and it operates through utility regulation rather than zoning, which means it reaches every data center in the service territory without any municipality having to act.
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Enacted (not yet in effect)
California AB 2383 data center electric tariffs (2026)
California · Effective January 1, 2027 · Cal. AB 2383 (2026), Ch. 435, Stats. 2026
AB 2383 requires the California Public Utilities Commission to make each investor-owned electric utility file separate transmission/distribution and generation tariffs for data centers, so that data centers pay a reasonable share of costs such as wildfire mitigation and liability, electrification and environmental programs. Community choice aggregators and electric service providers must adopt data center generation tariffs by January 1, 2028. Generation tariffs must use a payment mechanism of at least 10 years, with early termination and non-completion fees, so other ratepayers are held harmless; data centers can reduce these obligations by installing zero-emissions resources behind the meter. Governor Newsom signed it on September 21, 2026 as part of a seven-bill data center package that a law-firm alert says primarily takes effect January 1, 2027.
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Enacted (not yet in effect)
California SB 886 Technology Innovation and Ratepayer Protection Act (2026)
California · Effective January 1, 2027 · Cal. SB 886 (2026), Ch. 438, Stats. 2026 (Pub. Util. Code § 945 et seq.)
SB 886, the California Technology Innovation and Ratepayer Protection Act, requires the California Public Utilities Commission by January 1, 2028 to set new tariffs or rules for connecting large data center customers to the grid and serving them, and to make sure those tariffs do not shift costs or leave stranded costs on other customers. Data centers seeking transmission-level service bear the cost of the transmission upgrades they need, and one that leaves within 10 years of interconnection or fails to ramp up its load must pay an early termination fee. Data centers may join a new demand response program that costs other customers nothing, and utilities may seek approval of individual contracts in the meantime. Governor Newsom signed it on September 21, 2026.
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Enacted (not yet in effect)
Oklahoma SB 259 Groundwater Modernization Act (2026)
Oklahoma · Effective November 1, 2026 · Okla. S.B. 259 (2026) (Groundwater Modernization Act) (eff. Nov. 1, 2026)
Oklahoma's Groundwater Modernization Act, Senate Bill 259, was signed on August 6, 2026 and takes effect November 1, 2026. It requires water permit holders to file annual water-use reports with the Oklahoma Water Resources Board, and directs the Board to write rules for reviewing those reports, investigating complaints of waste, and imposing penalties for overuse. The structure matters: reporting alone produces data nobody acts on, so the Act pairs the disclosure duty with an investigation power and a penalty power in the same statute. It was signed as half of a package with House Bill 2992, the Data Center Customer Ratepayer Protection Act — legislators presented the two together as addressing the two resources data centers strain hardest. The Act is not limited to data centers; it reaches all water permit holders, which makes it broader in application than most 2026 data-center-driven measures while still being the instrument Oklahoma chose to answer data center water use.
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In effect
Texas PUCT large load interconnection rule (2026)
Texas · Effective October 8, 2026 · 16 TAC §25.194 (PUCT Project No. 58481, order adopted Sept. 18, 2026; effective Oct. 8, 2026)
The Public Utility Commission of Texas adopted its final rule on September 18, 2026 for connecting very large electricity users, such as data centers, to the ERCOT grid. It applies to new or expanded loads of 75 megawatts or more at a single site. Developers pay a flat $100,000 study fee and must post financial security of $50,000 per megawatt of requested peak demand. The final rule dropped a proposed non-refundable interconnection fee of $50,000 per megawatt and relaxed some milestone and refund terms compared with the March proposal. The rule implements Senate Bill 6 (2025).
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In effect
Michigan PSC DTE–Google data center contracts
Michigan · Effective October 1, 2026 · Michigan PSC Case No. U-22058 (order Oct. 1, 2026)
Michigan's Public Service Commission approved DTE Electric's special power contracts with Google for a planned data center in Van Buren Township, on the condition that other customers do not bear the project's costs. The 20-year deal includes a minimum bill of 80% of contracted capacity and an early-exit payment covering at least 15 years of minimum charges. Google must also pay for up to 1,600 MW of renewable energy and 480 MW of battery storage built by DTE.
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In effect
Texas AG data center water-reporting investigation (2026)
Texas · Effective September 24, 2026 · Texas OAG press release (Sept. 24, 2026)
On September 24, 2026, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced that his office is investigating data center developments in Texas that have not answered the Texas Water Development Board's water use survey. State law requires the Board to survey entities that use groundwater or surface water for municipal, industrial, power generation or mining purposes. Paxton is demanding that every data center in Texas submit a survey response that fully complies with the law. The first round of the investigation covers data centers in 18 counties, including Harris, Dallas, Travis, Bexar and El Paso.
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In effect
Maryland EO 01.01.2026.16 data center framework (2026)
Maryland · Effective September 23, 2026 · Md. Exec. Order 01.01.2026.16 (Sept. 23, 2026)
Maryland Governor Wes Moore signed an executive order on September 23, 2026 that sets one statewide review process for large data centers, meaning those with 25 megawatts or more of peak electric demand. A new Maryland Data Center Accountability Task Force will judge each project on five principles: ratepayer and grid protection, economic benefit, community voice, environmental protection, and transparency. Each project gets a public rating of Aligned, Conditionally Aligned or Not Aligned. For projects rated Not Aligned, or that never ask for a rating, state agencies will not offer letters of support, advocacy or incentives, and will hold off on substantive permit review until local land-use approvals are in place. The order also bars executive agencies from signing non-disclosure agreements with data center developers, and creates a public Data Center Dashboard updated monthly.
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In effect
Virginia EO 22 (2026) — data center accountability + AI task force
Virginia · Effective September 18, 2026 · Va. Exec. Order No. 22 (Sept. 18, 2026)
Virginia's governor signed an executive order on September 18, 2026 that does two separate things: it starts implementing a new Virginia Data Center Accountability Framework, and it creates a rapid-response AI Task Force. Most of the data center half is instruction — agencies are told to study, draft, consult and report back within 120, 180 and 240 days. TWO provisions bite immediately. First, no executive branch agency may enter into, enforce, or require a nondisclosure agreement that keeps the public from learning material information about a proposed commercial data center, its public incentives, its expected resource demands, or its community impacts; existing NDAs are honored, but new ones (absent extraordinary circumstances such as national security) violate the order. Second, effective on issuance, the Virginia Economic Development Partnership may no longer give a new data center project with anticipated peak demand of 25 MW or more any assistance through the Virginia Business Ready Sites Program, any expedited permitting program, or any similar discretionary state site-readiness or expedited-review program. The order also DESIGNATES the Eastern Virginia Groundwater Management Area a cooling water scarcity area and tells DEQ to expedite rules for noise and for cooling water scarcity. READ THE PRESS COVERAGE CAREFULLY: national and local outlets reported that Virginia was 'eliminating by-right approval' and 'requiring local approval of any data center using more than 25 megawatts.' Those are items in the framework the governor will ask the 2027 General Assembly to pass. THEY ARE NOT IN THIS ORDER. A governor cannot rewrite local land use law by executive order, and this one does not try to. What the order's own 25 MW threshold governs is eligibility for STATE economic-development assistance, not local approval.
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In effect
Nevada EO 2026-005 — responsible data center standard
Nevada · Effective September 18, 2026 · Nev. Exec. Order No. 2026-005 (Sept. 18, 2026) — Nevada Standard for Responsible Data Center Development
Nevada's governor signed an executive order creating what his office calls the Nevada Standard for Responsible Data Center Development. It works through the state's tax-abatement gate rather than through zoning or permitting: a data center developer that wants a partial tax abatement from the Governor's Office of Economic Development must now pay the Local School Support Tax IN FULL — that portion may not be abated in any amount — and must sign a binding Nevada Community Support Commitment before its application can go to the GOED Board at all. The commitment covers siting, neighboring communities, workforce, community benefits and transparency, and requires the developer to meet local water standards, to cover the cost of serving its own facility rather than passing that cost to other ratepayers, and to avoid straining the electrical grid during emergencies. The order sets a floor: a combined sales and use tax rate of not less than 4.6 percent, made up of the Sales and Use Tax Act and the Local School Support Tax, neither abatable. It also directs the state to produce a Responsible Speed to Power Plan identifying the generation and transmission needed to serve anticipated large-load demand through 2036. WHAT IT DOES NOT DO: it does not restrict, cap, or ban data center construction anywhere in Nevada. A developer willing to forgo a state tax abatement is not reached by this order at all. Its background matters for reading its strength — a 2015 abatement statute had obliged GOED to grant abatements to data centers meeting employment, wage and investment thresholds, with no energy or water protections and no discretion to refuse; the 2025 Legislature restored the Board's authority to deny, reduce or condition an award, and this order exercises that recovered discretion.
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In effect
Oregon state-land data center transaction pause (2026)
Oregon · Effective September 8, 2026 · Oregon — Governor's directive pausing state land transactions and permits for new data centers (issued on or about September 8, 2026; effective through July 1, 2027)
Governor Tina Kotek ordered Oregon state agencies to immediately stop processing unapproved land transactions and permits for new data center projects on public land, a pause that runs through July 1, 2027. It covers easements, leases, rentals, land-use permits, and sales or transfers of state-owned property for data centers. The reach of this measure is specific and should not be overstated: it governs what the state does with land it owns. It is not a statewide moratorium on data centers, and it does not restrict a developer who buys private land and goes to a city or county for approval. What it does is remove the state itself as a supplier of data center sites for nearly a year. Kotek's stated reason is that rapid data center growth should not shift utility and infrastructure costs onto Oregonians. The order follows her earlier decision to block the sale of 32 acres of state land at the Mill Creek Corporate Center in Salem that had been proposed for a data center, and it sits on top of the 2025 POWER Act, which raised electricity rates for data center corporations while lowering them for other Portland General Electric customers. An advisory committee formed in January 2026 is due to deliver recommendations by the end of the year, which the Governor plans to turn into legislation in the 2027 session. Demonstrators at the Capitol the same week pressed her to go further than state land.
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In effect
Delaware HB 310 large-load tax credit bar (2026)
Delaware · Effective August 26, 2026 · Del. H.B. 310, 153rd Gen. Assemb. (2026)
Delaware House Bill 310 prohibits large energy-use facilities from qualifying for job-creation business tax credits and license fee reductions. The logic is straightforward and rarely legislated: incentives designed to reward employment should not flow to facilities whose defining characteristic is enormous resource consumption and comparatively few permanent jobs. Rather than argue the point project by project, Delaware removed the eligibility. It was signed by Governor Matt Meyer on August 26, 2026 as one of four bills in the Energy Consumer Protection package, effective immediately. Most states in 2026 addressed data centers through moratoriums, zoning or utility cost allocation; disqualifying them from economic development incentives is a distinct lever, and one that operates on the state's own fiscal exposure rather than on siting or rates.
- 82 more
- Hualapai Tribal Council data center opposition resolution · Hualapai Tribe (AZ) · In effect
- Kentucky Beshear data center executive order (2026) · Kentucky · In effect
- Oklahoma HB 2992 data center ratepayer protection (2026) · Oklahoma · In effect
- Ohio PUCO data center default service notice order (2026) · Ohio · In effect
- Arizona ACC cooperative large-load process (2026) · Arizona · In effect
- Oneida Nation (WI) temporary data center moratorium (2026) · Oneida Nation (WI) · In effect
- Virginia SCC data center transmission cost order (2026) · Virginia · In effect
- NY Hochul EO — Statewide Data Center Moratorium (2026) · New York · In effect
- NM Land Commissioner blocks Project Jupiter pipeline (July 14, 2026) · NM · In effect
- Ostergaard v. Microsoft — data center noise class action (2026) · Wisconsin · Blocked / in litigation
- Virginia § 15.2-2209.5 data center siting disclosure law (2026) · Virginia · In effect
- Illinois data center tax-incentive pause (DCEO, July 2026) · Illinois · In effect
- Indiana data center local revenue share, IC 6-2.5-15-15.5 (2026) · Indiana · In effect
- Ohio — DeWine pause of the data center sales tax exemption program (2026) · Ohio · In effect
- Utah HB 76 data center water transparency (2026) · Utah · In effect
- OR PUC Data Center Rate Class · OR · In effect
- VA SCC Data Center Rate Case · VA · In effect
- PA HB 1924 data center water/energy reporting (signed July 12, 2026) · PA · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- CA SB 1168 — data center grid cost allocation · California · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- IL EO 2026-07 AI Cabinet (2026) · Illinois · In effect
- AZ HB 2756 Utilities/High Load Factor · AZ · In effect
- West Virginia 20-year data center development plan (2026) · West Virginia · In effect
- Texas Gov. Abbott data center grid-connection audit freeze · Texas · In effect
- Muscogee (Creek) Nation digital infrastructure task force · Muscogee (Creek) Nation · In effect
- Nebraska Gov. Pillen EO rescinding ImagiNE Act data center incentives for new applications · Nebraska · In effect
- Kickapoo Tribe (OK) Data Center Opposition (2026) · Kickapoo Tribe of Oklahoma · In effect
- S731/A796 — Data center ratepayer protection and grid-demand · New Jersey · In effect
- TN HB 1847 data center ratepayer protection (2026) · TN · In effect
- Shoshone-Bannock FHBC Opposition to Pocatello Data Center (2026) · Shoshone-Bannock Tribes (Fort Hall Reservation) · In effect
- Arizona 3-year data center tax exemption pause · Arizona · In effect
- Virginia HB 496 data center water-use reporting (2026) · Virginia · In effect
- Arizona Data Center Tax Incentive Moratorium (3-year, 2026) · Arizona · In effect
- VA Data Center Cost-Allocation Law · Virginia · In effect
- SB 484 (FL Data Center Costs) · Florida · In effect
- WA SB 5982 (Data Center / Clean Energy) · Washington · In effect
- Oregon HB 4084 Data Center Tax Moratorium · Oregon · In effect
- Order 26-154 Approving PGE Large-Load Tariff Framework for D · Oregon Public Utility Commission (Portland General Electric) · In effect
- Model Tariff Framework for Large Load Customers (Docket M-20 · Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission · In effect
- We Energies Very Large Customer (VLC) Data Center Tariff Ord · Public Service Commission of Wisconsin (We Energies) · In effect
- Cherokee Nation EO 2026-02-CTH (Data Center Task Force) · Cherokee Nation (OK) · In effect
- LeChee Chapter (Navajo Nation, AZ) data center opposition resolution (2026) · LeChee Chapter (Navajo Nation, AZ) · In effect
- New GS-5 Data Center / Large Load Rate Class, DEV 2025 Bienn · Virginia State Corporation Commission (Dominion Energy Virginia) · In effect
- AEP Ohio Data Center Tariff Order (Case 24-0508-EL-ATA) · Public Utilities Commission of Ohio (AEP Ohio) · In effect
- Minnesota State systemwide Generative AI guidance and approv · Minnesota State (Minnesota State Colleges and Universities) · In effect
- Texas SB 6 (Data Center Grid Law) · Texas · In effect
- Oregon POWER Act · Oregon · In effect
- Large-Load Flexible Tariff Investigation for Facilities Reac · Utah Public Service Commission (Rocky Mountain Power / PacifiCorp) · In effect
- I&M Industrial Power (Large Load) Tariff Settlement Order (C · Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission (Indiana Michigan Power) · In effect
- Rule Establishing Special Contract Terms for Large-Load Cust · Georgia Public Service Commission (Georgia Power) · In effect
- VA Data Center Tax Exemption · Virginia · In effect
- Pennsylvania Municipal Data Center Moratorium Bills (Coleman · Pennsylvania · Proposed / pending
- Virginia FY2026-2028 Biennial Budget: Data Center Electricit · Virginia · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- North Carolina Senate Bill 730 (Data Center Water and Coolin · North Carolina · Proposed / pending
- Senate Bill 1345 - Municipal Data Center Development Morator · Pennsylvania · Proposed / pending
- Maine Data Center Moratorium (vetoed) · Maine · Vetoed
- LG&E/KU CPCN Order Addressing Extremely High Load Factor Dat · Kentucky Public Service Commission (LG&E and KU) · Proposed / pending
- Large Load Tariff Docket Opened via Duke Energy Progress/Car · Public Service Commission of South Carolina · Proposed / pending
- NM Project Jupiter air permit hearing (Oct 19, 2026) · NM · Proposed / pending
- SB436 · GA · Expired
- SB526 · KS · Expired
- HB560 · MD · Expired
- HB6137 · MI · Proposed / pending
- HB6138 · MI · Proposed / pending
- SB1050 · MI · Proposed / pending
- HB6139 · MI · Proposed / pending
- HB6135 · MI · Proposed / pending
- HB6140 · MI · Proposed / pending
- SF4203 · MN · Expired
- SF5231 · MN · Expired
- HF5125 · MN · Expired
- HB2359 · PA · Proposed / pending
- HB2516 · PA · Proposed / pending
- HB2655 · WA · Expired
- New Jersey Quijano AI data center delay and study commission bill (2026) · New Jersey · Proposed / pending
- Ohio bill to prohibit data center property tax exemptions (2026) · Ohio · Proposed / pending
- NC AG framework for a Duke data center rate class (2026) · North Carolina · Proposed / pending
- VA Data Center Siting Bill (Vetoed) · Virginia · Vetoed
- GA Data Center Tax Break Fight · Georgia · Vetoed
- NY Responsible Data Center Development Act (passed, awaiting Governor) · New York · Proposed / pending
- NJ developer litigation against municipal data center bans (2026) · New Jersey · Blocked / in litigation
- Vermont — Gov. Scott veto of large data center regulatory framework (2026) · Vermont · Vetoed
- PUCT v. Texas AG — data center survey records · Texas · Blocked / in litigation
County data-center siting and energy rules (291)
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Enacted (not yet in effect)
PWC DCOZOD Reform (DPA2026-00006)
Prince William County, VA · Effective October 22, 2026 · PWC DPA2026-00006 (DCOZOD amendment), BOS unanimous adoption September 22, 2026
The Prince William County Board of County Supervisors voted UNANIMOUSLY (8-0) on September 22, 2026 to adopt DPA2026-00006, a comprehensive plan and zoning text amendment that substantially reduces and redefines the Data Center Opportunity Zone Overlay District (DCOZOD) created in 2016. Most future data center projects in the county now require a special use permit rather than the former by-right approval. Only parcels meeting one or more of five county-defined eligibility pathways remain in the overlay. A 90-day grace period allows developers who want to build under the old by-right rules to file applications before the new requirements take effect, roughly until December 21, 2026.
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In effect
Lawrence County IL two-year data center moratorium (2026)
Lawrence County, IL · Effective September 17, 2026 · Lawrence County, Ill. — unanimous two-year moratorium on data centers exceeding 10,000 square feet (2026)
The Lawrence County Board voted UNANIMOUSLY to approve a TWO-YEAR moratorium on data centers, pausing new development across the county. The temporary ban applies to any data center facility EXCEEDING 10,000 SQUARE FEET. Board members said the pause will give local officials and residents time to study the potential impacts, infrastructure demands and community effects before allowing projects to move forward. Board Chairman Jim Brewer put the reasoning in unusually candid terms: 'We did the moratorium so we as a board and the citizens could be better educated on problems or possibly benefits of data centers.' And then: 'We don't know that, but I would rather put a moratorium on something that is unknown than let it go through.' That is a precautionary rationale stated without varnish — not a claim that data centers are harmful, but a claim that the county does not yet know, and that not knowing is itself a reason to wait. Two years is at the long end of what this dataset records. Most county pauses run six to eighteen months, and the longer the term, the more a moratorium depends on the county showing it is actively drafting regulations rather than simply refusing to decide. Nothing in the reporting indicates a challenge, and Illinois does not impose the express statutory ceiling that Minnesota and Wisconsin do.
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In effect
Los Angeles County prohibition on data centers in unincorporated areas (2026)
Los Angeles County, CA · Effective September 17, 2026 · Los Angeles County, Cal. — Department of Regional Planning memorandum prohibiting large-scale AI data center development in unincorporated areas, September 17, 2026, pending zoning code amendment
Los Angeles County's planning director ordered an IMMEDIATE PROHIBITION on the development of large-scale data centers that power artificial intelligence across the county's UNINCORPORATED AREAS. Department of Regional Planning Director AMY BODEK issued the directive in a memorandum on Thursday, September 17, 2026, saying it is intended to serve as INTERIM GUIDANCE FOR PLANNING STAFF while the county moves toward codifying the prohibition in its zoning code. This is the largest jurisdiction to act in this dataset. Los Angeles County is the most populous county in the United States, and its unincorporated areas alone hold more people than many states. The path here is worth following because it is not a moratorium. Board Chair and First District Supervisor HILDA SOLIS introduced a motion in April 2026 addressing public health and environmental concerns about data centers, and THE BOARD OF SUPERVISORS APPROVED IT UNANIMOUSLY. The county's report back on that motion identified ZONING CHANGES THAT WOULD PROHIBIT THESE FACILITIES — not pause them. The planning director's memorandum holds the line in the meantime; Solis says she intends to bring further actions before the Board to implement the Regional Planning and Public Health departments' recommendations and amend the zoning code. Solis gave two reasons. The first is local and specific: 'I introduced it in response to concerns raised by San Gabriel Valley residents who were understandably concerned about the effects of data centers in their communities, concerns that have since been reflected nationwide.' The second is not local at all: 'The need for such a ban has only been further underscored by alarming developments from the AI sector on CATASTROPHIC IMPACTS THE TECHNOLOGY MAY HAVE ON HUMANITY.' That is the second American local government in this dataset, after Gary, Indiana, to put AI existential risk on the record as a reason for a land-use restriction — and unlike Gary it is paired with an ordinary public-health and environmental record.
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In effect
Sauk County WI 18-month data center moratorium (2026)
Sauk County, WI · Effective September 15, 2026 · Sauk County, Wis. — 18-month moratorium on data center applications and zoning approvals, adopted 27-1 on September 15, 2026
The Sauk County Board voted 27-1 on Tuesday, September 15, 2026 to stop accepting data center applications and granting data center zoning approvals for 18 months in the parts of the county under county zoning. County leaders say they are not aware of any data center project currently planned in Sauk County. That is the point. Supervisor William Kinsman told the board the county has no specific mechanism in its zoning ordinance to address a data center proposal at all, and officials said the goal is to get regulations in place BEFORE a developer comes forward. This is pre-emptive rather than reactive, which matters legally: a moratorium enacted while an application is pending invites vested-rights litigation, and this dataset already records several moratoriums defeated exactly that way. Sauk County faces no such exposure. One caution belongs on the face of this entry: 18 months is a long moratorium under Wisconsin practice, where the usual understanding is an initial term of up to 12 months with one 6-month extension. An 18-month term adopted in a single enactment is at the outer edge of that framework, and its defensibility, if challenged, would turn on the county's record of actively drafting regulations.
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In effect
Latah County ID data center regulations (2026)
Latah County, ID · Effective September 15, 2026 · Latah County, Idaho — data center ordinance adopted September 15, 2026 (conditional use in industrial zone; groundwater cooling prohibition; noise and electrical limits; annual electrical reporting)
Latah County's Commissioners approved new data center rules on Tuesday, September 15, 2026 — and the notable thing is that they adopted SUBSTANTIVE STANDARDS instead of a pause, at a moment when almost every other county in this dataset was buying time. The ordinance applies to data centers proposed on Latah County land, NOT inside incorporated cities, and it makes data centers a CONDITIONALLY PERMITTED USE in the industrial zoning designation. The strongest provision is about water. 'Consumptive use of groundwater for routine cooling operations is prohibited,' the ordinance states, and 'Groundwater shall not be used as the primary source of cooling water.' Groundwater may still be used for non-consumptive or sanitary purposes. A company proposing a data center must also produce a WATER MANAGEMENT PLAN detailing how it will minimise impacts on the local water supply. The county is following recently passed Idaho legislation limiting how much groundwater may be used for data centers. The ordinance also caps NOISE and ELECTRICITY CONSUMPTION, and — unusually — imposes an ongoing reporting duty: 'An annual report shall be submitted that details electrical consumption, maximum peak demand, and any significant modifications to the electrical system.' That is a continuing obligation, not a one-time permit condition, and very few local measures in this dataset have one. There is no data center proposed in Latah County. At a September 9 public hearing, community members asked for a moratorium or an outright ban. Commissioner Tony Johnson said that since nothing is proposed, a moratorium does not make sense, and that the regulations are the county's way of preparing for what could happen. Planning director Michelle Fuson said it is unlikely a data center will be built on county land, but the county can always modify its rules if it needs to.
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In effect
Woodford County KY permanent data center ban (2026)
Woodford County, KY · Effective September 8, 2026 · Woodford County, Ky. — Fiscal Court Ordinance (Sept. 8, 2026)
On September 8, 2026 the Woodford County Fiscal Court unanimously passed an ordinance permanently banning the construction of data centers, landfills, and large battery storage systems anywhere in the county. This is a permanent prohibition, not a temporary moratorium — the Kentucky Association of Counties told the Kentucky Lantern that Woodford is the first Kentucky county it is aware of to enact a permanent data center ban, and it places the county among only a handful of local governments nationwide to go that far. Judge-Executive James Kay said the Fiscal Court chose a permanent ban over a temporary pause because residents were universally opposed, framing the ordinance as farmland preservation: 'We are a tight-knit community with a finite, irreplaceable amount of land. Every single acre matters here. Our rolling pastures, our historic farms, our agriculture, are not just scenic views. They are the backbone of our economy.' Large battery storage was included because such systems are frequently paired with hyperscale data centers. Woodford County sits in the Bluegrass region between Lexington and Frankfort; the Fiscal Court had signalled the move in June 2026 when it first voted to block future data centers.
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In effect
Woodford County KY permanent data center ban (2026)
Woodford County, KY · Effective September 8, 2026 · Woodford County, Ky. — ordinance permanently banning data centers, landfills and large battery storage (adopted September 8, 2026)
On September 8, 2026 the Woodford County Fiscal Court voted unanimously to permanently ban the construction of data centers in the county — the first Kentucky county to do so. This is not a moratorium. Where almost every other local measure in this dataset pauses development for six months, a year, or three years while the jurisdiction writes rules, Woodford County simply prohibited the use. The ordinance also bans landfills and large battery storage systems, which are frequently paired with hyperscale data centers to smooth their electricity demand — so the ban reaches the supporting infrastructure as well as the facility itself. The county framed the decision around farmland rather than electricity or water bills. Judge-Executive James Kay put it as 'Woodford County's future is rooted in our land and water. Our future is farming,' and the county described the ordinance as protecting farmland, honoring farming families and safeguarding the quiet character of the countryside. Woodford County sits in the Bluegrass region, where the land at stake is horse and crop farmland. Kentucky already has a separate two-year moratorium in Bell County and a governor's executive order on data center development; this is the first permanent prohibition.
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In effect
Rowan County KY two-year data center moratorium (2026)
Rowan County, KY · Effective September 1, 2026 · Rowan County, Ky. — two-year moratorium on large-scale data centers (2026)
The Rowan County Fiscal Court approved a TWO-YEAR moratorium on large-scale data centers, giving county leaders time to consider how future projects would be reviewed before any arrives. County officials were explicit that nothing is pending. Judge-Executive Harry Clark: 'First and foremost, we have not been approached by anyone for a data center.' Jason Slone, president and CEO of the Morehead-Rowan County Chamber of Commerce, put the reasoning plainly — 'But it is going to be a matter of time at some point.' Two years is long for a local pause, and it sits well beyond the twelve-to-eighteen-month windows that municipal officials elsewhere in this dataset have described as the outer limit of what a moratorium can defend. Kentucky county fiscal courts, however, operate differently from municipal zoning boards, and the state's other long pause — Bell County's two years — was adopted without apparent challenge. Rowan County joins an unusually active Kentucky cohort: Woodford County adopted the state's first permanent ban in September 2026, Bell County a two-year moratorium, Logan County a twelve-month water-focused pause, Mercer County a one-year pause, Nicholasville six months, and Lexington-Fayette Urban County its own moratorium, alongside a governor's executive order on data center development.
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In effect
Henry County VA data center district ordinance (2026)
Henry County, VA · Effective August 25, 2026 · Henry Cnty., Va. — Data Center District Zoning Ordinance Amendment (Aug. 25, 2026)
Henry County's Board of Supervisors unanimously adopted a revised data center ordinance on August 25, 2026, and its structure does more work than a moratorium would. The ordinance creates a new Data Center District (D-C). Data centers are permitted only inside that district, and only then with a special use permit approved by the Board of Zoning Appeals. The catch — and it is deliberate — is that no property in Henry County is currently zoned D-C. Any company wanting to build must first acquire or control land, then apply to have it rezoned into the district, and then separately win a special use permit. Two discretionary approvals stand between a developer and a building permit, with no site anywhere in the county pre-cleared. The ordinance also sets a 1,000-foot setback from any property not zoned industrial, and imposes requirements on noise, water use, electrical infrastructure, cooling systems, screening, lighting, emergency response and decommissioning. It is a permanent regulatory framework, not a pause. The board reached it the hard way: more than 100 residents packed the July 28, 2026 public hearing to raise concerns about water, noise, health and animal habitats, and the board sent the draft back to the drawing board before returning with this stricter version. Henry County is in southern Virginia on the North Carolina line, around Martinsville.
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In effect
Nye County NV data center ban in Basin 162 (2026)
Nye County, NV · Effective August 18, 2026 · Nye County, Nev. Bill No. 2026-11, amending Nye County Code Title 17 (adopted August 18, 2026)
On August 18, 2026 the Nye County Board of Commissioners voted 5-0 to ban the construction and operation of data centers anywhere in Nevada Hydrographic Basin 162 — the Pahrump Valley groundwater basin, which covers more than 500,000 acres across most of southern Nye County and runs east toward the Clark County line. This is not a pause: it is a permanent zoning prohibition, adopted as Bill No. 2026-11 amending Title 17 of the county code. Nye County is the first local government in Nevada to ban data centers outright rather than temporarily. The stated reason is water. Basin 162 is already over-appropriated, meaning the state has granted rights to more water than the basin reliably produces, and commissioners concluded that adding a large new industrial water user would deepen the shortfall. The ban blocks the proposed 900-acre Manse Technology Campus from Gigawatt Development Partners LLC, even though that company says it had already secured water rights for the project. Elsewhere in Nye County a separate county-wide moratorium adopted in June 2026 still applies until the county writes permanent data center regulations.
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In effect
Madison County AR three-year data center moratorium (2026)
Madison County, AR · Effective August 17, 2026 · Madison County, Ark. — three-year data center moratorium with emergency clause (adopted August 17, 2026; expires August 31, 2029)
The Madison County Quorum Court voted unanimously on August 17, 2026 to impose a three-year moratorium on data centers, running through August 31, 2029. The court attached an emergency clause, which meant the moratorium took effect immediately rather than after the usual waiting period — a detail that matters, because a developer cannot file in the gap. The moratorium is written broadly, covering data centers, digital asset mining businesses and other large-scale computer or server operations, so a cryptocurrency mining operation cannot be argued to fall outside it. The stated purpose is to give county officials time to study data centers and develop regulations addressing their potential costs and benefits. Three years is long for a local pause. Madison County is one of five Arkansas counties that adopted three-year moratoriums, and its is the second-longest in the state after Independence County's. Arkansas saw a cluster of these in August 2026.
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In effect
Independence County AR five-year data center moratorium (2026)
Independence County, AR · Effective August 11, 2026 · Independence County, Ark. — Quorum Court five-year moratorium on data centers (2026)
The Independence County Quorum Court placed a FIVE-YEAR MORATORIUM on data centers, reported on August 11, 2026. Five years is extraordinary. The overwhelming majority of local pauses in this dataset run six to eighteen months; the previous longest recorded here was two years, in Lawrence County, Illinois and in a Nash County-area North Carolina measure. Independence County has adopted a pause two and a half times the usual ceiling. That length is worth flagging carefully rather than celebrating. Moratorium defensibility generally turns on reasonableness and on the municipality showing it is actively working toward permanent regulations — the longer the pause, the harder both are to sustain, because at some point a 'temporary' measure becomes a de facto prohibition adopted without the process a prohibition requires. Several states cap the term by statute precisely for this reason: Minnesota at twelve months, Wisconsin at twelve plus one six-month extension, California at two years in aggregate, Maine at renewable 180-day periods. Arkansas county government operates through the Quorum Court under Amendment 55 to the state constitution, and no equivalent express statutory ceiling on county moratoria is asserted here. No challenge is reported. This entry is recorded because a five-year pause is a real measure with real effect, and because it marks the outer edge of what local governments are currently attempting.
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In effect
Escambia County FL large-scale data center ban (2026)
Escambia County, FL · Effective August 1, 2026 · Escambia County, Fla. — ordinance banning large-scale data centers in unincorporated areas (approved August 2026)
The Escambia County Commission approved an ordinance BANNING large-scale data centers in the unincorporated areas of the county — everywhere outside the City of Pensacola and the Town of Century — and separately started the process for a moratorium. This is a prohibition, not a pause, which puts it in the small group of permanent bans in this dataset alongside Woodford County Kentucky and Nye County Nevada rather than with the moratoriums that make up most of the 2026 record. The territorial limit is the standard one for county land-use authority: Escambia's ban reaches unincorporated territory only, and the two incorporated municipalities inside the county make their own decisions. Pensacola has a separately indexed data center moratorium of its own. The sequencing is worth noting: the county adopted the ban FIRST and then began a moratorium process, which is the reverse of the usual order. A moratorium is normally the holding action taken while permanent rules are written; here the permanent rule came first, and the moratorium appears intended to cover whatever the ban does not. At a later meeting the commissioners stood firm on the existing ban and took no further action.
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In effect
Gulf County FL AI data center moratorium (2026)
Gulf County, FL · Effective July 27, 2026 · Gulf County, Fla. — Board of County Commissioners, 4-1 vote, 2026-07-27
The Gulf County Board of County Commissioners voted 4-1 on Monday, July 27, 2026 to approve a one-year moratorium on new AI data centers, to allow time to study potential impacts and develop a policy before any future projects are considered. Commissioner Phil McCroan moved the measure with Commissioner Randy Pridgeon's support; Commissioner Jack Husband cast the dissenting vote.
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In effect
Austin County TX data center and BESS moratorium (2026)
Austin County, TX · Effective July 27, 2026 · Austin County, Tex. — countywide moratorium on AI data centers and battery energy storage systems (adopted July 27, 2026)
Austin County Commissioners unanimously approved a countywide moratorium on artificial intelligence data centers and battery energy storage systems on July 27, 2026, becoming one of the first Texas counties to do so. The moratorium does not outright bar construction; it pauses approvals so the county can evaluate what these developments do. What sets it apart from almost every other pause in this dataset is what the county said it will examine and what it demands of developers in the meantime. The evaluation covers compliance with health, fire and safety requirements, CYBERSECURITY SAFEGUARDS, and enforcement mechanisms that can actually be applied to these projects in the unincorporated parts of the county — including the possible designation of a dedicated energy development zone. And the moratorium REQUIRES prospective developers to submit an equipment manufacturer audit to the county: a full list of every piece of equipment and every component proposed for use in the project. That is a supply-chain disclosure requirement, and no other local measure indexed here asks for one. It gives a rural county visibility into who made the hardware going into a facility on its land, which is a fire-safety question for battery storage and a security question for computing. Austin County was the second Texas county to adopt a data center moratorium after Hill County; San Marcos was the first Texas city, on June 30, 2026.
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In effect
Sierra County NM 18-month data center moratorium (2026)
Sierra County, NM · Effective July 21, 2026 · Sierra County, N.M. — 18-month data center moratorium (adopted July 21, 2026)
Sierra County commissioners voted unanimously on July 21, 2026 to impose an eighteen-month moratorium on data centers — one of the longest local pauses in this dataset, and one that nobody expected that morning. The item on the agenda was a resolution simply OPPOSING the development of large-scale data centers in the county, which would have carried no legal force at all. After more than an hour of public comment at the regular Tuesday morning meeting in Truth or Consequences, the commissioners amended the item on the floor into a binding eighteen-month moratorium and passed it. The Albuquerque Journal called it a surprise vote. What prompted it was the emergence of details about a proposed solar-powered data center at Spaceport America, which sits on state trust land inside Sierra County. Opponents argued it would use too much water and damage the environment. Sierra County joined Santa Fe and Socorro counties in pushing back on large-scale data centers near the Spaceport, and New Mexico lawmakers were separately proposing a statewide moratorium for the next legislative session.
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In effect
Henderson County NC data center regulations (eff. July 15, 2026)
Henderson County, NC · Effective July 15, 2026 · Henderson County, NC code amendment, July 15, 2026, extending crypto-mining regulations to all data centers
Henderson County, North Carolina (Hendersonville area) now applies its strict crypto-mining rules to all data centers. Under a code amendment adopted July 15, 2026, data centers are allowed only in industrial zones with a special use permit, must sit 100 feet back from property lines, cannot operate between 9 p.m. and 6 a.m. or on Sundays, cannot exceed 50 decibels measured at 100 feet, must build an 8-foot sound wall, and must be at least 2 miles from any other such facility.
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In effect
Santa Fe County NM data center moratorium (2026)
Santa Fe County, NM · Effective July 9, 2026 · Santa Fe County, N.M. Ordinance No. 2026-06
Section 5 bars the County from accepting any new application for a Development Approval or Development Permit for a Data Center, bars the Board and any County body from further processing or acting on such applications, and bars issuance of any such approval or permit. 'Data Center' means a facility, or proposed expansion, designed or used primarily for housing, managing, operating or transmitting data with a proposed aggregate IT Load Capacity of 1 megawatt or greater, expressly including hyperscale, artificial-intelligence computing, cloud, colocation and cryptocurrency mining facilities, and excluding ordinary computer rooms, server closets and IT equipment incidental to a principal lawful use. Exemptions cover sub-threshold facilities, County-owned or County-operated governmental data processing, applications deemed complete before the effective date, and facilities with vested rights as determined by the County Land Use Administrator.
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In effect
Jackson County FL data center ban (unincorporated, eff. June 23, 2026)
Jackson County, FL · Effective June 23, 2026 · Jackson County, Fla., Board of County Commissioners ordinance banning data centers in unincorporated county areas (final vote June 9, 2026; effective June 23, 2026)
The Jackson County, Florida Board of County Commissioners unanimously approved a permanent ordinance banning data centers in unincorporated areas of the county after three public hearings. The ban took effect June 23, 2026 and replaces an earlier moratorium. It was triggered by community opposition to a proposed AI-focused data center near Compass Lake in Jackson County's panhandle territory. The ordinance also directed county staff to develop future comprehensive plan amendments addressing water use, electrical infrastructure, noise, environmental impacts, and traffic. Municipalities within Jackson County must adopt their own restrictions to be bound; the ban applies only to unincorporated county areas.
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In effect
Woodbury County IA Resolution 14064 — 12-month data center moratorium
Woodbury County, IA · Effective June 23, 2026 · Woodbury County, IA Resolution 14064 (adopted 5-0, June 23, 2026)
The Woodbury County (IA) Board of Supervisors voted unanimously 5-0 on June 23, 2026 to adopt Resolution 14064, a 12-month moratorium on data center applications in unincorporated Woodbury County. The moratorium prohibits the county from accepting, processing, or approving any zoning, subdivision, site plan, conditional use permit, building permit, rezoning, or other development application for any type or class of data center in unincorporated areas of the county, for 12 months from adoption. The resolution does not affect data center projects already approved or those within incorporated city limits. The vote was triggered in part by a proposal involving approximately 900 acres of farmland near Salix that MidAmerican Energy had proposed annexing into city limits — a maneuver the moratorium could not reach once annexation occurred. Woodbury County's county seat is Sioux City.
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In effect
Knox County TN one-year data center moratorium (2026)
Knox County, TN · Effective June 23, 2026 · Knox County, Tenn. — one-year data center moratorium resolution (adopted June 23, 2026; expires June 30, 2027)
Knox County Commission adopted a one-year data center moratorium on June 23, 2026. It took effect immediately and runs through June 30, 2027, and the Commission can vote to extend it. The moratorium is unusually carefully drafted for a local measure, and three features are worth knowing. First, the trigger is a peak electric demand of 5 megawatts — a low threshold compared with the 20 to 50 megawatt lines other jurisdictions have drawn — and a facility that REFUSES TO DISCLOSE its power demand is covered too, so a developer cannot escape the moratorium by staying silent. Second, five existing operations are grandfathered by name: Bitdeer Tennessee, Infinity Data Center, Scipio Technologies, Tenhats Knoxville and Windstream Knoxville. Naming them removes the usual argument about who was operating when the ordinance passed. Facilities owned or operated by the State of Tennessee or by Knox County itself are also outside the moratorium, subject to conditions on leasing. Third — and this is the part most local moratoriums lack — existing data centers may not expand their power contracts or switch to alternative energy sources such as gas turbines in order to work around the limits. That closes the two most obvious routes to growing under a freeze. The City of Knoxville, a separate government inside the county, adopted its own one-year moratorium in July 2026; the Knoxville-Knox County Planning Commission then approved a recommended moratorium and zoning framework on August 13, 2026 for the County Commission to act on.
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In effect
Cumberland County NC Six-Month Data Center Moratorium
Cumberland County, NC · Effective June 15, 2026 · Six-month moratorium adopted 2026-06-15 by 7-0 vote
On June 15, 2026, the Cumberland County (NC) Board of Commissioners voted 7-0 to adopt a six-month data-center moratorium running through December 15, 2026. The moratorium covers unincorporated areas only; data centers proposed inside Fayetteville city limits are not affected. The moratorium pauses new data-center construction while county staff and commissioners develop a regulatory ordinance.
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In effect
Walton County FL data center ban (eff. June 10, 2026)
Walton County, FL · Effective June 10, 2026 · Walton County, FL ordinance (5-0, June 10, 2026) prohibiting data centers and large load centers countywide
Walton County, Florida (Panhandle, including the 30A beach communities) permanently banned data centers and other large electric-load centers countywide on June 10, 2026, by unanimous 5-0 vote. The ban has an intentionally steep exception path: approving any data center would require all five commissioners voting yes, after three public workshops and two public hearings. This is one of the strongest local data center prohibitions in the country.
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In effect
Howard County MD S.M.A.R.T. Siting Act data center moratorium (2026)
Howard County, MD · Effective June 1, 2026 · Howard Cnty., Md. Council Bill 31-2026 (S.M.A.R.T. Siting Act) (June 1, 2026)
Howard County unanimously passed Council Bill 31-2026 on June 1, 2026 — the S.M.A.R.T. Siting Act, where S.M.A.R.T. stands for Strategic Moratorium for Assessing Responsible Technology. It halts development of new data centers in Howard County through November 2, 2027, roughly a 17-month pause. The Act does not just stop development; it sets up the work that is meant to replace it, creating a SMART Data Center Task Force charged with defining and reviewing best practices for how data centers should be built and operated in the county and issuing a final report recommending siting and location standards. The county began seeking applicants for the task force in July 2026. Howard County sits between Baltimore and Washington along the I-95 corridor, and its action was part of a Maryland county wave through 2026 that also took in Montgomery, Prince George's, Baltimore City, Calvert and Queen Anne's.
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In effect
Troup County GA Data Center Ordinance
Troup County, GA · Effective May 8, 2026 · Troup County, Ga., data-center zoning text amendment (adopted May 8, 2026, unanimous)
On May 8, 2026, the Troup County Board of Commissioners voted unanimously to adopt a data-center zoning ordinance for unincorporated Troup County and lifted its earlier moratorium. All data centers must obtain a special-use permit; average and hyperscale data centers are limited to heavy-industrial zoning, while small data centers (5,000 sq ft or smaller) may locate in light- or heavy-industrial zones. The 17-page ordinance requires a 1,500-foot setback, Tier 4 diesel backup generators (rather than Tier 2) to cut noise and emissions, connection to public sewer, solar-ready roof structures, and post-operation low- and high-frequency noise studies.
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In effect
Cass County IN Data Center Ban
Cass County, IN · Effective April 22, 2026 · Cass County, Ind., Comm-Ord-2026-08 (Data Processing), Bd. of Comm'rs (Apr. 22, 2026) — bars data centers countywide
On April 22, 2026, the three Cass County Commissioners voted unanimously to prohibit data centers throughout the county, blocking data-processing uses from every zoning district. The county Plan Commission recommended the ban because Cass County had no established standards for data centers and wanted to prevent development until (or unless) rules are written. Cass is one of two Indiana counties — with Marshall County — reported to have banned new data centers outright as of mid-2026.
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In effect
Marshall County Data Center Ban
Marshall County, IN · Effective April 20, 2026 · Marshall County, Ind., Bd. of Comm'rs ordinance (Apr. 20, 2026)
On April 20, 2026, Marshall County commissioners enacted a permanent, countywide ban on data centers, effective immediately, replacing an earlier one-year moratorium. County leaders cited long-term strain on electricity and water supplies and loss of farmland — possibly the first permanent county data center ban in Indiana.
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In effect
Athens-Clarke County GA Data Center Regulations
Athens-Clarke County, GA · Effective April 7, 2026 · Moratorium adopted 2025-12-02; extended 2026-03-10; lifted and replaced by ordinance unanimously 2026-04-07
On December 2, 2025, the Athens-Clarke County Commission adopted a temporary moratorium on new data centers (running through the first Tuesday in March 2026), extended in March 2026 for an additional three months. On April 7, 2026, the Commission voted unanimously to lift the moratorium and replace it with a set of data-center regulations. Athens-Clarke is a consolidated city-county government in Georgia.
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In effect
Fulton County IN One-Year Data Center Moratorium
Fulton County, IN · Effective March 3, 2026 · Adopted 2026-03-03 by Commissioners (2-1 vote)
On March 3, 2026, the Fulton County (IN) Commissioners voted 2-1 to approve a one-year moratorium on data-center construction, effective immediately. Commissioners Bryan Lewis and a second commissioner voted in favor; Commissioner Dave Sommers was the lone dissenter. The Area Plan Commission had recommended the moratorium 6-2 earlier. The moratorium was triggered by a proposed 300-acre campus in the town of Akron. A data-center committee will study impacts during the pause.
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In effect
Baltimore County MD data center moratorium (Bill 3-26; extension Bill 79-26)
Baltimore County, MD · Effective February 18, 2026 · Baltimore County Council Bill 3-26 (enacted Feb. 4, 2026; eff. Feb. 18, 2026), as extended by Bill 79-26 (passed Sept. 22, 2026)
Baltimore County, Maryland has suspended data center permitting since February 2026. Bill 3-26, enacted February 4 and effective February 18, 2026, stopped the county from issuing data center permits or approving development plans or zoning petitions for data centers while the Planning Board studied the issue; it was set to run until January 1, 2027 or 90 days after the Planning Board's report, whichever came first. The Planning Board finalized its report on September 17, 2026. On September 22, 2026 the County Council voted unanimously for Bill 79-26, which extends the pause to December 31, 2027; it takes effect 14 days after it is enacted.
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- Starke County IN Ordinance 2025-37 · Starke County, IN · In effect
- Stafford County VA Data Center Ordinance O25-29(R) · Stafford County, VA · In effect
- Johnson County IA One-Year Data Center Moratorium · Johnson County, IA · In effect
- James City County VA Data Center Ordinance & Policy · James City County, VA · In effect
- Clayton County GA Resolution 2025-193 · Clayton County, GA · In effect
- Henrico County VA Data Center Comprehensive Plan Amendment · Henrico County, VA · In effect
- Loudoun County VA Data Center Standards & Locations Phase 1 · Loudoun County, VA · In effect
- Imperial County CA CEQA ruling, 330 MW data center EIR (2026) · Imperial County, CA · Blocked / in litigation
- Wakulla County FL data center prohibition ordinance (2026) · Wakulla County, FL · In effect
- Jasper County SC data center moratorium and pending ordinance doctrine (2026) · Jasper County, SC · Proposed / pending
- Manatee County FL 12-month data center moratorium (Ord. 26-42) · Manatee County, FL · In effect
- Blaine County ID 182-day emergency data center moratorium · Blaine County, ID · In effect
- San Joaquin County CA 45-day data center urgency moratorium · San Joaquin County, CA · In effect
- Beaufort County NC one-year data center moratorium · Beaufort County, NC · In effect
- Levy County FL data center moratorium Ord. 2026-05 (2026) · Levy County, FL · In effect
- Mesa County CO 12-month data center moratorium (2026) · Mesa County, CO · In effect
- Winneshiek County IA 12-month data center moratorium (2026) · Winneshiek County, IA · In effect
- Gage County NE 12-month data center moratorium (Sept 16, 2026) · Gage County, NE · In effect
- Steuben County IN six-month data center moratorium (2026) · Steuben County, IN · In effect
- Marion County FL 12-month large data center moratorium (2026) · Marion County, FL · In effect
- Laurens County SC one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Laurens County, SC · In effect
- Chatham County GA 155-day data center moratorium (2026) · Chatham County, GA · In effect
- Lake County FL 8-month data center moratorium · Lake County, FL · In effect
- Putnam County FL data center moratorium (2026) · Putnam County, FL · In effect
- Lake County IL eight-month data center moratorium (2026) · Lake County, IL · In effect
- Orangeburg County SC one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Orangeburg County, SC · In effect
- Talbot County, MD — 12-month data center moratorium (Res. 395) · Talbot County, MD · In effect
- Lincoln County WA 6-month data center/BESS emergency moratorium · Lincoln County, WA · In effect
- Nash County NC countywide data center moratorium (2026) · Nash County, NC · In effect
- Mendocino County CA data center moratorium (Sept 2026) · Mendocino County, CA · In effect
- Franklin County KS data center moratorium (2026) · Franklin County, KS · In effect
- Calvert County MD six-month data center site plan moratorium (2026) · Calvert County, MD · In effect
- Clark County IN one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Clark County, IN · In effect
- Emmet County IA 1-year precautionary data center moratorium · Emmet County, IA · In effect
- Calaveras County CA 45-day data center moratorium · Calaveras County, CA · Status unknown
- Carlton County MN 1-year data center moratorium (2026) · Carlton County, MN · In effect
- Durham County NC nine-month data center moratorium (2026) · Durham County, NC · In effect
- Botetourt VA Google data center 2 MGD water cap (2026) · Botetourt County, VA · In effect
- Spokane County WA 4-month data center moratorium (Aug 2026) · Spokane County, WA · In effect
- Jackson County NC one-year data center moratorium (2026-02) · Jackson County, NC · In effect
- Tulare County CA data center moratorium (extended to Aug 2027) · Tulare County, CA · In effect
- Oneida County WI one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Oneida County, WI · In effect
- Anderson County SC six-month data center moratorium (2026) · Anderson County, SC · In effect
- Amherst County VA data center zoning rules (2026) · Amherst County, VA · In effect
- Alamance County NC one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Alamance County, NC · In effect
- Yadkin County NC two-year data center moratorium (2026) · Yadkin County, NC · In effect
- Shawnee County KS 6-month data center moratorium · Shawnee County, KS · In effect
- Cass County NE 12-month data center moratorium · Cass County, NE · In effect
- Mercer County KY one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Mercer County, KY · In effect
- Warrick County IN 180-day data center moratorium (2026) · Warrick County, IN · In effect
- Chippewa County WI 12-month data center moratorium (2026) · Chippewa County, WI · In effect
- Jefferson County IA data center ordinance + 12-month moratorium · Jefferson County, IA · In effect
- Wabash County IN data center moratorium (Ordinance 2026-85-08) · Wabash County, IN · In effect
- Washington County IN 12-month data center moratorium (2026) · Washington County, IN · In effect
- Flagler County FL 1-year data center moratorium · Flagler County, FL · In effect
- Carter County TN data center and crypto mining moratorium (2026) · Carter County, TN · In effect
- Athens County OH township and county data center moratoria (2026) · Athens County, OH · In effect
- Iowa County IA data center moratorium · Iowa County, IA · In effect
- Bannock County ID 180-day data center moratorium (2026) · Bannock County, ID · In effect
- Taylor County IA Ordinance 40 — 12-month data center/BESS/solar moratorium · Taylor County, IA · In effect
- Loudoun VA zoning administrator: data centers not by-right under 1972 ordinance · Loudoun County, VA · In effect
- DeSoto County FL 1-year data center moratorium (DCIP exemption) · DeSoto County, FL · In effect
- Montgomery County MD 18-month data center moratorium · Montgomery County, MD · In effect
- Paulding County GA data center moratorium through January 1, 2027 · Paulding County, GA · In effect
- Logan County KY 12-month data center moratorium (2026) · Logan County, KY · In effect
- Greenwood County SC one-year data center moratorium, Ord. 2026-25 (enacted July 21, 2026) · Greenwood County, SC · In effect
- Delta County MI 12-month data center + crypto moratorium (2026) · Delta County, MI · In effect
- Cherokee County GA data center moratorium (extended through Feb 14, 2027) · Cherokee County, GA · In effect
- Monroe County WI data center + battery storage moratorium (2026) · Monroe County, WI · In effect
- Yankton County SD six-month data center moratorium (2026) · Yankton County, SD · In effect
- Caroline County MD, Federalsburg and Ridgely data center moratoria (2026) · Caroline County, MD · In effect
- Polk County WI one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Polk County, WI · In effect
- LaGrange County IN Data Center Moratorium (effective 2026) · LaGrange County, IN · In effect
- Palm Beach County FL Project Tango denial (July 16, 2026) · Palm Beach County, FL · In effect
- Hamilton County TN 1-year data center moratorium (eff. July 15, 2026) · Hamilton County · In effect
- Franklin County FL 1-year data center moratorium (eff. July 15, 2026) · Franklin County, FL · In effect
- Newberry County SC 12-month data center moratorium (confirmed July 15, 2026) · Newberry County, SC · In effect
- Logan County NE 12-month data center moratorium · Logan County, NE · In effect
- Pasco County FL 1-year data center moratorium (eff. July 14, 2026) · Pasco County, FL · In effect
- Hernando County FL 1-year data center moratorium (Ord. 2026-23) · Hernando County, FL · In effect
- Early County GA data center ordinance (eff. July 13, 2026) · Early County, GA · In effect
- St. Charles County MO 6-month data center moratorium (eff. July 13, 2026) · St. Charles County, MO · In effect
- Walker County GA data center moratorium (extended through ~Feb 2027) · Walker County, GA · In effect
- Missoula County MT interim data center moratorium (eff. July 9, 2026) · Missoula County, MT · In effect
- Prince George's County MD 2-year data center moratorium · Prince George's County, MD · In effect
- Sarasota County FL hyperscale data center moratorium (eff. July 8, 2026) · Sarasota County, FL · In effect
- Douglas County GA data center rezoning denial (July 8, 2026) · Douglas County, GA · In effect
- Terrell County GA 6-month data center moratorium · Terrell County, GA · In effect
- Pine County MN 12-month data center moratorium (2026) · Pine County, MN · In effect
- Hamblen County TN AI Datacenter Moratorium · Hamblen County, TN · In effect
- Humboldt County NV 1-year data center moratorium · Humboldt County, NV · In effect
- Two-year moratorium on data center construction and operatio · Bell County, Kentucky · In effect
- Linn County IA 18-month data-center moratorium (2026) · Linn County, Iowa · In effect
- Linn County IA EU-3 rezoning moratorium (2026) · Linn County, IA · In effect
- Snohomish County WA six-month data center moratorium (2026) · Snohomish County, WA · In effect
- Clay County FL 1-year data center moratorium · Clay County, FL · In effect
- Shenandoah County VA First Data Center Zoning Ordinance · Shenandoah County, VA · In effect
- Jackson County MO 180-day data center + BESS moratorium (eff. June 22, 2026) · Jackson County, MO · In effect
- Geary County KS 12-month data center moratorium · Geary County, KS · In effect
- La Crosse County WI 18-month data center moratorium (2026) · La Crosse County, WI · In effect
- Hancock County IN data center overlay district (IG-only, June 2026) · Hancock County, IN · In effect
- Plymouth County IA 1-year data center & battery storage moratorium · Plymouth County, IA · In effect
- Coweta County GA second 180-day data center moratorium · Coweta County, GA · In effect
- Sioux County IA 1-year data center & battery storage moratorium · Sioux County, IA · In effect
- Butler County OH 6-Month Data Center Moratorium · Butler County, OH · In effect
- Madison County IN Six-Month Data Center Moratorium · Madison County, IN · In effect
- Boone County Data Center Moratorium · Boone County, IN · In effect
- Chester County SC data center pause (2026) · Chester County, SC · In effect
- Six-month data-center permit moratorium (Montgomery County, MD) · Montgomery County, Maryland · In effect
- McLean County Data Center Rules · McLean County, IL · In effect
- Floyd County GA 80-Day Data Center Moratorium · Floyd County, GA · In effect
- DeKalb County GA data-center moratorium (through Mar 30, 2027) · DeKalb County, Georgia · In effect
- DeKalb County GA Data Center Moratorium (latest extension to Sept 30, 2026) · DeKalb County, GA · Expired
- Socorro County Data Center Moratorium · Socorro County, NM · In effect
- Coffee County Data Center Moratorium · Coffee County, TN · In effect
- Lee County IA 1-year data center moratorium · Lee County, IA · In effect
- Madison County IN data center moratorium (2026) · Madison County, IN · In effect
- Otoe County NE Up-to-One-Year Data Center Moratorium · Otoe County, NE · In effect
- Des Moines County IA 1-year data center moratorium · Des Moines County, IA · In effect
- Riley County KS 6-month data center moratorium (2026) · Riley County, KS · In effect
- Hill County TX 1-Year Data Center & Energy Storage Moratorium (ADOPTED May 12, R · Hill County, TX · Repealed / replaced
- Simpson County KY data center CUP ordinance (2025/2026) · Simpson County, KY · In effect
- Miami County IN data center moratorium (2026) · Miami County, IN · In effect
- Champaign County IL one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Champaign County, IL · In effect
- Orange County NC one-year data center moratorium (Apr 2026) · Orange County, NC · In effect
- Athens-Clarke County GA data center ordinance (April 2026) · Athens-Clarke County, GA · In effect
- Tippecanoe County IN Large Data Center Special Exception Amendment · Tippecanoe County, IN · Proposed / pending
- Warren County VA · Warren County, VA · In effect
- Cochise County AZ Ordinance 26-09 (Data Center Standards) · Cochise County, AZ · In effect
- Grant County PUD WA Unbundled Rate Restructure + Data Center Load Caps · Grant County, WA · In effect
- Shenandoah County VA · Shenandoah County, VA · In effect
- Grant County IN 24-month data center moratorium (2026) · Grant County, IN · In effect
- Rockdale County GA Data Center & BESS Moratorium (extended through Sept 8, 2026) · Rockdale County, GA · Expired
- Carroll County GA Data Center Moratorium · Carroll County, GA · In effect
- Hall County GA 180-day data center moratorium · Hall County, GA · Expired
- Cobb County GA data center moratorium (extended through ~Feb 2027) · Cobb County, GA · In effect
- Cobb County GA Temporary Data Center Moratorium (up to 180 days) · Cobb County, GA · In effect
- Henry County GA · Henry County, GA · In effect
- Linn County IA Data Center Ordinance for Unincorporated Areas · Linn County, IA · In effect
- Chatham County, NC — one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Chatham County, NC · In effect
- Maricopa County AZ Modernized Zoning Ordinance · Maricopa County, AZ · In effect
- Bartow County GA Data Center Ordinance (UDO Amendment) · Bartow County, GA · In effect
- DeKalb County GA Data Center Moratorium · DeKalb County, GA · In effect
- Coweta County GA Data Center Ordinance (UDO Amendment) · Coweta County, GA · In effect
- Maricopa County AZ Modernized Zoning Ordinance · Maricopa County, AZ · In effect
- Spotsylvania County Data Center Design Standards Ordinance · Spotsylvania County, VA · In effect
- Monroe County GA Data Center Moratorium · Monroe County, GA · Expired
- Putnam County IN Data Center Moratorium · Putnam County, IN · In effect
- Johnson County IA 1-year data center moratorium · Johnson County, IA · In effect
- Lake County IN Data Center Zoning Standards · Lake County, IN · In effect
- Stafford County Data Center Zoning Ordinance + Comp Plan Amendment · Stafford County, VA · In effect
- White County IN Data Center Moratorium · White County, IN · In effect
- Loudoun County VA Data Center Standards & Locations Phase 2 Project Plan · Loudoun County, VA · Proposed / pending
- Forsyth County GA Data Center Regulations (UDC Amendment) · Forsyth County, GA · In effect
- Culpeper County CUP Requirement for Data Centers on Industrial Land (outside Tec · Culpeper County, VA · In effect
- Freeborn County MN data center moratorium extension (2026) · Freeborn County, MN · In effect
- Williamson County TX Data Center Subdivision & Infrastructure Standards · Williamson County, TX · In effect
- Story County IA Data Center Moratorium (Resolution #25-97) · Story County, IA · Expired
- Spotsylvania County End of By-Right Data-Center Zoning · Spotsylvania County, VA · In effect
- Douglas County GA 90-Day Data Center Moratorium (extended Aug 2025) · Douglas County, GA · Expired
- Fairfax County Data Center Zoning Ordinance Amendment · Fairfax County, VA · In effect
- Fauquier Vint Hill PCID Large-Building Special Exception Amendment · Fauquier County, VA · In effect
- Fauquier County Data Center Development Policy Guidance (BP/PCID only) · Fauquier County, VA · In effect
- Culpeper County Repeal of Brandy Station Technology Zone · Culpeper County, VA · In effect
- Lee County GA Data Center Moratorium · Lee County, GA · In effect
- Ida County IA indefinite data center moratorium · Ida County, IA · In effect
- Worcester County MD data center + cable landing moratorium (2026) · Worcester County, MD · In effect
- MD Supreme Court blocks Frederick County DC zoning referendum · Frederick County, MD · Blocked / in litigation
- Elmore County ID data center moratorium (2026) · Elmore County, ID · In effect
- Woodford County IL six-month data center moratorium (2026) · Woodford County, IL · In effect
- Palm Beach County FL one-year large data center moratorium (2026) · Palm Beach County, FL · In effect
- Pulaski County AR data center regulations ordinance 26-I-56B (vetoed Sept 2026) · Pulaski County, AR · Vetoed
- Pinellas County FL large data center ban resolution (2026) · Pinellas County, FL · In effect
- Marshall County IA 6-month data center moratorium (2026) · Marshall County, IA · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Scott County KY data center moratorium (extended to Mar 2027) · Scott County, KY · In effect
- Anne Arundel County MD Bill 63-26 data center moratorium (proposed) · Anne Arundel County, MD · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Fairfield County SC 12-month data center moratorium (Ord. 856) · Fairfield County, SC · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Kershaw County SC one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Kershaw County, SC · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Marathon County WI 12-month data center moratorium (2026) · Marathon County, WI · In effect
- Humboldt County CA 45-day data center moratorium · Humboldt County, CA · In effect
- Osceola County FL large-scale AI data center application deferral · Osceola County, FL · In effect
- Cherokee County GA data center moratorium extended 180 days (2026–2027) · Cherokee County, GA · In effect
- Ordinance imposing a moratorium on land use and development · Colleton County, SC · In effect
- Huntington County IN data center/BESS/carbon capture moratorium (2026) · Huntington County, IN · In effect
- Pima County AZ 120-day data center moratorium · Pima County, AZ · In effect
- Spartanburg County SC 1-year data center moratorium (2026) · Spartanburg County, SC · In effect
- Wood County WI data center notice ordinance (Ord. 26-9-2) · Wood County, WI · In effect
- Fairbanks North Star Borough data center moratorium request (2027 priorities) · Fairbanks North Star Borough, AK · In effect
- Lowndes County GA 60-day AI data center moratorium · Lowndes County, GA · In effect
- Shadowbox Studios v. DeKalb County GA — moratorium challenge (2026) · DeKalb County, GA · Proposed / pending
- Boyd County KY six-month data center moratorium (2026) · Boyd County, KY · In effect
- Dougherty County GA data center moratorium (extended ~Feb 2027) · Dougherty County, GA · In effect
- Washington County (MD) 12-month data center moratorium · Washington County, MD · In effect
- 12-month moratorium on data center construction, permits, an · Seward County, NE · In effect
- One-year moratorium on new data center applications · Spartanburg County, SC · In effect
- Two-year moratorium on data centers, crypto mining, battery storage · Anderson County, Tennessee · In effect
- One-year data-center moratorium in unincorporated Boone County · Boone County, Indiana · In effect
- Imperial County Data Center Moratorium (45-day, adopted June 16, 2026) · Imperial County, CA · Repealed / replaced
- Six-month data-center moratorium (Cumberland County, NC) · Cumberland County, North Carolina · In effect
- Box Elder County temporary data center moratorium · Box Elder County, UT · In effect
- Dane County WI Hyperscale Data Center Moratorium · Dane County, WI · In effect
- Hill County TX Data Center Developer Checklist · Hill County, TX · In effect
- Colquitt County GA data center moratorium extension (Gulf Trough geological concern) · Colquitt County, GA · In effect
- First data center zoning regulations · St. Charles Parish, LA · In effect
- 24-month moratorium on data center construction · Allen County, KY · In effect
- Iron County 180-day moratorium on new data center applicatio · Iron County, UT · In effect
- 12-month moratorium on data centers · Dubuque County, IA · In effect
- One-year moratorium on new data center permits (Interim Ordi · Otoe County, NE · In effect
- Comal County TX Resolution on Data Center Impacts · Comal County, TX · In effect
- Rockdale County data-center + BESS moratorium extended through Sept 8 · Rockdale County, Georgia · Expired
- Camden County GA 6-month data center moratorium (first coastal GA county) · Camden County, GA · In effect
- Calvert County data-center text amendments adopted May 5, 2026 · Calvert County, Maryland · Proposed / pending
- Manitowoc County WI Data Center Moratorium · Manitowoc County, WI · In effect
- Morgan County IL 6-month data center moratorium (2026) · Morgan County, IL · In effect
- Glynn County GA Data Center Zoning Ordinance · Glynn County, GA · In effect
- Data Center Land-Use Regulations (buffer, setback, decommiss · New Castle County, DE · In effect
- Temporary moratorium on data centers, nuclear and hydrogen f · Saline County, KS · In effect
- Bulloch County GA data center moratorium through Dec 31, 2026 (ban rejected Sept 1) · Bulloch County, GA · In effect
- Data center zoning ordinance for unincorporated Linn County · Linn County, IA · In effect
- Newton County data-center application moratorium · Newton County, Georgia · Expired
- Interim moratorium pausing data center applications · Sedgwick County, KS · In effect
- Moratorium on data center construction in unincorporated Har · Harvey County, KS · In effect
- Spotsylvania County VA Data Center Design Standards · Spotsylvania County, VA · In effect
- Morton County moratorium on data centers and cryptocurrency · Morton County, ND · In effect
- Santa Fe County 18-month data center moratorium · Santa Fe County · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Union County ordinance establishing a moratorium on data cen · Union County · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Yellowstone County data center construction voter-approval i · Yellowstone County · Proposed / pending
- Morris County resolution urging state oversight of data cent · Morris County · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- In re: Frederick Cnty. Data Center Referendum (No. 67, Sept. · Frederick County · Blocked / in litigation
- Ordinance 2026-32 - 180-Day Moratorium on Data Center Develo · Cache County · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Loudoun County VA considering data center moratorium · Loudoun County, VA · Proposed / pending
- Tazewell County IL data center petition freeze (2026) · Tazewell County, IL · In effect
- Finch-Mincey v. Effingham County (data center zoning ordinance, 2026) · Effingham County, GA · Blocked / in litigation
- One Hundred Miles v. Effingham IDA (OpenAI data center, 2026) · Effingham County, GA · Blocked / in litigation
- Butte-Silver Bow data center initiative ballot litigation (2026) · Butte-Silver Bow, MT · Blocked / in litigation
- Bullitt County KY IT infrastructure moratorium (2026) · Bullitt County, KY · In effect
- Proposed 12-Month Data Center Moratorium (failed to pass) · Pulaski County, AR · Expired
- Oliver County 180-day data center construction moratorium (r · Oliver County, ND · Expired
- Leon County FL 18-month data center moratorium (voted July 14, 2026; hearings pending) · Leon County, FL · Proposed / pending
- Dodge County WI advisory data center resolution (29-2, mid-June 2026) · Dodge County, WI · Proposed / pending
- Proposed one-year ban on AI data centers (Holmes County, FL) · Holmes County, Florida · Proposed / pending
- Data center ZTA #25-187 (Charles County, MD) — Planning Commission recommended denial · Charles County, Maryland · Proposed / pending
- St. Joseph County IN hyperscale data center ban resolution (2026) · St. Joseph County, IN · Proposed / pending
- Davidson County NC 4-month data center moratorium (proposed, 2026) · Davidson County, NC · Proposed / pending
- Guilford County NC proposed 180-day data center moratorium · Guilford County, NC · Proposed / pending
- Custer County NE proposed data center regulations (2026) · Custer County, NE · Proposed / pending
- Clackamas County OR data center moratorium (proposed, 2026) · Clackamas County, OR · Proposed / pending
- Montgomery County TN proposed data center zoning rules (2026) · Montgomery County, TN · Proposed / pending
- McHenry County IL proposed 12-month data center moratorium · McHenry County, IL · Proposed / pending
- Volusia County FL proposed ban on 50MW+ data centers · Volusia County, FL · Proposed / pending
- Colleton County SC ACE Basin data center exclusion area (settlement) · Colleton County, SC · Proposed / pending
- Luzerne County PA proposed data center zoning amendments · Luzerne County, PA · Proposed / pending
- Bell County TX Data Center Oversight (under discussion) · Bell County, TX · Proposed / pending
- Knox County Data Center District (pending) · Knox County, TN · Proposed / pending
- Franklin County Zoning Rewrite (paused) · Franklin County, VA · Proposed / pending
- DeKalb County Data Center Regulations (pending) · DeKalb County, GA · Proposed / pending
- Eco TIP West LLC v. Chatham County (N.C. Super. Ct. 2026) · Chatham County, NC · Blocked / in litigation
- Manse Technology Campus challenge to Nye County data center ban (2026) · Nye County, NV · Blocked / in litigation
- IVCM v. Imperial County — data center moratorium set aside · Imperial County, CA · Blocked / in litigation
- Pima County Project Blue · Pima County, AZ · Blocked / in litigation
- PW Digital Gateway Litigation · Prince William County, VA · Blocked / in litigation
City / local data-center siting and energy rules (369)
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Enacted (not yet in effect)
Calexico, CA — permanent citywide data center ban (2026)
Calexico, CA · Effective October 16, 2026 · Calexico, Cal., Ordinance adding Calexico Mun. Code ch. 17.11, art. XII (adopted Sept. 16, 2026, effective 30 days thereafter)
Calexico has made data centers a prohibited land use across the entire city — not a pause, a permanent prohibition. The council adopted the ordinance 3-0 on September 16, 2026 at its second reading, and it takes effect 30 days later. The new Article XII of Chapter 17.11 of the municipal code is built out of five sections: purpose, definition, prohibition, exemption and enforcement. The prohibition section states that data centers are not a permitted land use within the city, and the definition reaches facilities housing networked computer systems for data storage, processing or distribution together with their supporting infrastructure. There is an exemption section, but its contents are not stated in the available reporting and should not be assumed. The city got here in stages: on June 3, 2026 the council directed staff to bring back a possible moratorium; on July 1, 2026 staff recommended an interim urgency ordinance under California Government Code section 65858, the state's emergency land-use pause authority, which bought time to write permanent rules; those rules are this ban. Calexico is the first city in Imperial County to prohibit data centers permanently.
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In effect
Coachella Permanent Data Center Ban
Coachella, CA · Effective September 25, 2026 · Coachella, Cal., Ordinance No. 1231 — Permanent Data Center Ban (adopted Aug. 26, 2026; effective Sept. 25, 2026)
The Coachella City Council unanimously passed the second and final reading of Ordinance No. 1231 on August 26, 2026, enacting a permanent citywide ban on large-scale data centers. The ordinance defines a data center as a structure or site used to house computers or equipment for storing, processing, or transmitting digital data, with exemptions for accessory server rooms and small IT facilities. The ban takes effect 30 days after adoption, approximately September 25, 2026. Coachella is the first city in the Coachella Valley to enact a permanent prohibition. The path to the ban began June 4, 2026 (urgency moratorium), extended July 9 through June 3, 2027, with the Planning Commission recommending permanent prohibition July 15-16 and the first reading passing unanimously August 12, 2026.
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In effect
Irwindale CA data center ban ordinance (2026)
Irwindale, CA · Effective September 16, 2026 · Irwindale, Cal. — zoning code ordinance prohibiting data centers, adopted unanimously September 16, 2026
Irwindale's City Council unanimously approved an ordinance banning data centers in the city on Wednesday, September 16, 2026, writing the prohibition into the zoning code. This is a PERMANENT BAN, not a temporary moratorium — an important distinction, because most of the local measures in this dataset are pauses of 45 days to 18 months while officials write rules. Irwindale decided not to write rules. The city's stated reasons, recorded when it recently updated its zoning code, were data centers' substantial and continuous electrical demand often supported by diesel or gas-powered backup generators, significant noise, significant water use for cooling systems, and the pressure such facilities create for related infrastructure and land-use changes. Mayor Manuel Ortiz framed the ordinance as compatible with growth: Irwindale should remain open to responsible economic development while carefully weighing the impact data centers would create. Irwindale joins a dense San Gabriel Valley cluster — El Monte and Monterey Park have both imposed bans or moratoriums. Two of those neighbours went further than an ordinance: Monterey Park and Alhambra approved BALLOT INITIATIVES putting the ban to voters, on the theory that a voter-enacted ban is harder to undo, since a future council can only overturn it with another ballot measure. Irwindale's mayor says the city has no plans for a ballot initiative, which means its ban rests on an ordinary council majority and a future council could repeal it.
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In effect
McDonald OH one-year data center moratorium (2026)
McDonald, OH · Effective September 16, 2026 · McDonald, Ohio — emergency ordinance imposing a one-year data center moratorium, adopted September 16, 2026
McDonald's village council took less than five minutes at a special meeting on Wednesday, September 16, 2026 to approve an EMERGENCY ORDINANCE placing a one-year moratorium on data centers. The brevity is the story. Recent meetings on the subject had run two hours or more, and on the Tuesday before the vote residents stood outside McDonald High School holding signs against data centers as people filed into the gymnasium to meet representatives of the developer. By the time the council convened, the argument was over. The moratorium means the village will not ACCEPT, PROCESS OR CONSIDER any applications for any data centers in the village — all three verbs, which closes the routes a narrower pause leaves open. Adopting it as an EMERGENCY measure matters under Ohio law: an emergency ordinance takes effect immediately on passage rather than after the usual waiting period, and in Ohio it is also not subject to referendum. For a village facing an active developer courting residents in a school gymnasium, immediate effect is the whole point — a thirty-day delay is thirty days in which an application can be filed. Councilman Brian Bosheff was unable to attend. Council President Sean Schmidt said council and village officials will always do what is in the best interest of the village and its residents.
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In effect
Cumberland RI data center zoning prohibition, Ordinance 26-22 (2026)
Cumberland, RI · Effective September 16, 2026 · Cumberland, R.I. — Ordinance 26-22 amending the zoning ordinance to list data centers as a prohibited use, adopted 6-1 on September 16, 2026
The Cumberland Town Council voted 6-1 on Wednesday, September 16, 2026 to amend the town's zoning ordinance so that DATA CENTERS ARE LISTED AS A PROHIBITED USE. This is a permanent prohibition written into the code, not a pause. Ordinance 26-22 was taken up for public hearing as old business and passed on a roll call vote; all seven council members were present. It had come out of the ordinance subcommittee's September 2 meeting with a favourable recommendation on a 2-1 vote. The sponsor, DISTRICT 4 COUNCILOR JODI SWEET, explained where the idea came from and it is an unusually candid account of how these ordinances propagate. She said it came to her AFTER WATCHING WHAT A NEIGHBOURING RHODE ISLAND TOWN WENT THROUGH when a data center sought to locate there. She then looked at what the state was doing and FOUND THAT MOST RELATED BILLS SAT IN COMMITTEE this legislative session — so the town acted because the state had not. Planning Director Amelia Morton and Town Director Romeo Mendes prepared a report with statistics attached to the ordinance. Sweet's figures, as she gave them: data centers have grown significantly larger since around 2023; a facility can use more energy in a day than an entire small city; ELECTRICITY PRICES IN VIRGINIA HAVE RISEN 267% OVER FIVE YEARS; and a large-scale data center can use as much water in a day as 16,000 HOUSEHOLDS — which she noted is CLOSE TO THE NUMBER OF HOUSEHOLDS IN CUMBERLAND. She also cited Rhode Island receiving only 80% of normal rainfall from June 2025 to May 2026, and described an expanding data center in a Massachusetts city, currently 352,000 square feet and built next to a neighbourhood, where residents deal with noise and diesel fumes from 27 BACKUP GENERATORS. Sweet framed the ordinance as an attempt to ensure power companies, the state and tech corporations 'get themselves in order' before anyone tries to build in town — and added, candidly, that 'no law or ordinance is forever.' Four members of the public spoke, all in favour.
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In effect
Lima OH 18-month data center + water service moratorium (2026)
Lima, OH · Effective September 14, 2026 · City of Lima, Ohio — 18-Month Data Center and Water Service Moratorium (Sept. 14, 2026)
Lima City Council passed an ordinance on September 14, 2026 enacting an 18-month moratorium with two distinct halves. The first is conventional: no data center construction in Lima. The second is not — the same ordinance also pauses new requests for city-supplied water to developments in outside municipalities. Lima sells water beyond its own borders, and a data center sited in a neighbouring jurisdiction where Lima has no zoning authority would still need that water. Pausing the service request is the only lever the city has over those projects, and it is the same move Lakeland, Florida made through its municipal electric utility six weeks earlier. Mayor Sharetta Smith framed the pause as prudence rather than opposition: Ohio has become one of the fastest-growing states for data center siting, state and federal rules around the facilities are changing, and the city wanted to evaluate its standards before making further large-scale commitments. The 18 months are for the administration to work out appropriate locations, water capacity, electric demand and other impacts. Lima is the seat of Allen County in northwest Ohio.
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In effect
Edgewater FL AI data center ban (2026)
Edgewater, FL · Effective September 14, 2026 · City of Edgewater, Fla. — AI Data Center Ban (Sept. 14, 2026); Charter Amendment 4 (Nov. 2026 ballot)
Edgewater city leaders voted unanimously on September 14, 2026 to ban artificial intelligence data centers, a measure Mayor Diezel DePew described as permanent. It took effect immediately. The ordinance is explicitly a bridge: Charter Amendment 4 goes before Edgewater voters in November 2026 and would write the same prohibition into the city charter, putting it beyond the reach of a future council that might simply repeal an ordinance. Councilmember Eric Rainbird said the city wanted to act before any developer submitted a proposal — no AI data center has been proposed in Edgewater. The mayor had earlier warned about strain on water and power. Edgewater sits in Volusia County on Florida's east coast, and the county is now split in two directions on the same question: Volusia County directed staff to draft a six-month study moratorium while Edgewater inside it moved a permanent voter-ratified ban to the ballot. Edgewater joins other Central Florida communities including Titusville and Flagler County in acting to block AI data centers.
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In effect
Valparaiso IN open-ended data center moratorium (2026)
Valparaiso, IN · Effective September 1, 2026 · City of Valparaiso, Ind. — data center moratorium with no fixed expiration date (2026)
Valparaiso City Council unanimously approved a moratorium on new data center development, effective immediately — and it carries NO FIXED EXPIRATION DATE. That is the distinguishing feature, and it is rare. Almost every local measure in this dataset states a term: forty-five days, six months, a year, eighteen months, three years. Valparaiso instead tied the moratorium's life to a DELIVERABLE: it holds new data center proposals while the city's Plan Commission reviews and recommends changes to Valparaiso's UNIFIED DEVELOPMENT ORDINANCE, and ends when that work is done. There is a real argument for structuring it this way. A fixed term creates a deadline the city may miss, after which either the pause lapses with no rules in place or the council must extend it — and extensions are where moratoriums run into their statutory ceilings, as officials in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Nevada have each said on the record elsewhere in this record. Tying the pause to completion of the ordinance removes that cliff. The corresponding risk is the mirror image: an open-ended pause with no external deadline has no forcing function, and it is precisely the shape a developer challenging a moratorium as indefinite or arbitrary would attack. Indiana's own practice matters here, and the located source does not address whether an open-ended municipal moratorium is sound under Indiana law. Valparaiso is in Porter County, which also contains Portage — whose Technology Campus district ordinance is the most numerically detailed instrument in this dataset.
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In effect
Shawnee OK data center moratorium through 2027
Shawnee, OK · Effective September 1, 2026 · City of Shawnee, Okla. — temporary moratorium on new data centers, effective immediately through the end of 2027
The City of Shawnee approved a temporary moratorium on new data centers, putting new proposals on hold THROUGH THE END OF 2027. It takes effect immediately. The end date is what distinguishes it. Almost every moratorium in this dataset is expressed as a duration — forty-five days, six months, twelve months — which means it expires on a rolling date the public has to calculate. Shawnee instead fixed a CALENDAR ENDPOINT, which from a mid-2026 adoption is roughly sixteen months. A fixed endpoint is easier for residents and developers to hold in mind and harder for a city to let lapse unnoticed, and it aligns the pause with budget and legislative cycles rather than with the accident of when the vote happened. It also puts Shawnee near the long end of this dataset's distribution, past the twelve-to-eighteen-month window municipal officials in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Nevada have each described on the record as the practical or statutory limit. Oklahoma has been unusually active on data centers — the state enacted HB 2992 protecting ratepayers from large-load costs and SB 259 on groundwater, Oklahoma City adopted an emergency rezoning moratorium, Edmond a permit moratorium, Tulsa a moratorium that ran from March, and four tribal nations have acted, including a Cherokee Nation ban on hyperscale development.
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In effect
Green Township OH moratorium on all new development (2026)
Green Township, OH · Effective September 1, 2026 · Green Township, Ohio — trustees' moratorium on all new development, adopted to prevent additional AI data center projects (2026)
Green Township's trustees passed a moratorium on ALL NEW DEVELOPMENT — not data centers specifically, but every kind of new development — expressly to prevent additional AI data center projects from starting in the township. This is the most sweeping instrument recorded anywhere in this dataset, and the reason it takes that form is almost certainly a limitation of Ohio township authority rather than a desire to halt all construction. Ohio townships have narrower zoning powers than municipalities, and a township without a data-center-specific definition in its resolution may have no clean way to single the use out. Halting everything reaches the target without needing a definition at all. That sidesteps the definitional problem this dataset records repeatedly — Poway trying to ban 'AI data centers' as a workload category, Marysville needing an enumerated list plus a server-room exclusion, a Port Angeles councilmember arguing the whole definitional exercise should be abandoned in favour of regulating impacts. It also carries an obvious cost that no other entry here carries: a blanket development moratorium stops housing, retail and every unrelated project too. Breadth is what makes it effective and also what makes it hardest to defend, since a measure justified by concern about one use but applied to all uses is exposed to the argument that it is not reasonably tailored to its purpose. No challenge is reported. Ohio is the most active state in the country on this question, with at least 138 municipalities and townships holding active data center moratoriums as of September 2026.
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In effect
Stafford Township NJ total data center ban (Ord. 2026-22)
Stafford Township, NJ · Effective August 25, 2026 · Stafford Twp., N.J. Ordinance No. 2026-22 (Aug. 25, 2026) (supplementing Twp. Code § 212-4.1)
Stafford Township adopted Ordinance No. 2026-22 unanimously on August 25, 2026, banning data centers everywhere in the township. The operative language is about as short as a land-use prohibition gets: 'All data centers are hereby prohibited from operating anywhere in the Township of Stafford.' The ordinance supplements Section 212-4.1 of the township code, the section headed 'Additional Prohibited Uses,' and defines data centers as facilities used to store and manage digital data. There is no zone where they are allowed and no sunset date — this is a permanent, township-wide prohibition rather than a pause. Stafford was one of three New Jersey municipalities to ban data centers the same night, alongside North Brunswick and East Brunswick, making it the 37th in the state to do so. Stafford Township is in Ocean County on the Jersey Shore, adjoining Manahawkin and the Long Beach Island causeway.
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In effect
Garfield Township MI data center and crypto mining ban (2026)
Garfield Township, MI · Effective August 25, 2026 · Charter Township of Garfield, Mich. — one-year ban on data centers and cryptocurrency mining adopted under a zoning ordinance amendment (August 25, 2026)
Garfield Township's board unanimously banned data centers and cryptocurrency mining facilities for one year on August 25, 2026, with an option to extend for six more months. Township Supervisor Joe McManus said the pause lets officials plan properly for future proposals and update the township's zoning ordinance. The procedural choice behind it is the reason this entry is worth reading. Rather than adopt a standalone moratorium ordinance or resolution — the route most townships take — Garfield's Planning Commission first recommended an amendment to the ZONING ORDINANCE itself that authorizes temporary bans, and the moratorium was then enacted under that authority. Township officials said plainly why: municipalities that imposed knee-jerk moratoriums without going through this process are being challenged in court and losing. In other words Garfield spent the extra procedural steps to buy defensibility, which is a distinction that matters a great deal when a developer sues. The practical effect is to stall a proposal by Illinois-based developer Tom Cervenka to repurpose a building on Cass Road as a small-scale data center. Garfield Township is in Grand Traverse County in northern Michigan, and its action came while Michigan legislators were still debating a statewide data center moratorium.
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In effect
Chesapeake Beach MD townwide data center prohibition (2026)
Chesapeake Beach, MD · Effective August 20, 2026 · Town of Chesapeake Beach, Md. Ordinance O-26-14 (adopted August 20, 2026)
Data centers are no longer permitted anywhere in Chesapeake Beach. The Town Council approved ORDINANCE O-26-14 without opposition on August 20, 2026, after a public hearing, prohibiting the facilities in every town zoning district. The mechanism is worth understanding because it is cleaner than most prohibitions in this dataset. The ordinance does two things at once: it REMOVES data centers from the list of uses permitted in the town's Maritime Commercial zone — the only district where they had been allowed — and it ADDS them to the section of the land-use table covering EXPRESSLY PROHIBITED uses. Data centers were already not permitted in any of the town's other zoning districts. Deleting the one permission and simultaneously naming the use as expressly prohibited closes both halves of the question: a developer cannot argue the use is permitted somewhere, and cannot argue it is merely unaddressed and therefore allowable by analogy to a similar use. That second argument is the one that has caught out jurisdictions whose codes were simply silent — Clayton, Ohio adopted a moratorium precisely because its code had no definition and a data center could arguably enter as a warehouse. Chesapeake Beach is a small town on the Chesapeake Bay in Calvert County, Maryland, and this is a permanent prohibition rather than a pause.
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In effect
Jersey City NJ data center ban in industrial zones (Ord. 26-057)
Jersey City, NJ · Effective August 19, 2026 · Jersey City, N.J. Ordinance 26-057 (Aug. 19, 2026)
The Jersey City Council voted unanimously on August 19, 2026 to bar new data centers from the city's industrial zones. Ordinance 26-057 amends the Land Development Ordinance to strike data centers and 'cyber hotels' from the list of permitted principal uses in the Industrial District. This is a permanent zoning change, not a temporary pause. It is also narrower than it first sounds: the city already has five data centers operating inside existing office buildings shared with other tenants, and those are untouched. What the ordinance stops is new standalone facilities taking industrial land. That framing is the point — Jersey City's industrial land is some of the last remaining in the city, and it had been open to a use that draws enormous electricity and water, occupies a large footprint and produces comparatively few permanent jobs. Jersey City is New Jersey's second-largest city and became the 34th municipality in the state to ban data centers; by that point more than a million New Jersey residents lived somewhere the facilities are prohibited.
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In effect
Ypsilanti Township MI electric utility infrastructure moratorium (2026)
Ypsilanti Township, MI · Effective August 18, 2026 · Charter Township of Ypsilanti, Mich. — six-month land-use moratorium on major electric utility facilities (adopted August 18, 2026)
Ypsilanti Township's Board of Trustees unanimously approved a land-use moratorium on August 18, 2026 — and the thing it regulates is not data centers. It places a SIX-MONTH PAUSE on land use for the establishment or substantial expansion of a MAJOR ELECTRIC UTILITY FACILITY. That is a genuinely different instrument from everything else in this dataset, and it is the most transferable idea recovered in this triage. A hyperscale computing facility cannot run without dedicated high-capacity power, which in practice means a new on-site substation. A township that regulates the SUBSTATION reaches the project without ever having to define, classify or prohibit a 'data center' — and without the definitional fights that have forced other jurisdictions to amend their codes. The target here is specific. The University of Michigan had announced days earlier that it had selected a preferred location for what it describes as a computing research facility, on a Textile Road plot the university confirmed purchasing in March. The project includes a U-M academic research facility AND A CLASSIFIED RESEARCH FACILITY FOR LOS ALAMOS NATIONAL LABORATORY's work — and an electrical substation, which U-M said it would build with DTE Energy as a dedicated on-site facility. Township Supervisor Brenda Stumbo said the pause allows the township to evaluate and adopt ordinances regulating the kind of infrastructure required to power projects like it. The township is therefore asserting land-use authority over the power supply to a federal national-laboratory classified facility, which is an unusual posture worth watching.
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In effect
Swatara Township PA data center ordinance (2026)
Swatara Township, PA · Effective August 17, 2026 · Swatara Township, Pa. — ordinance governing data centers and revising the residential forest district (adopted August 2026)
The Swatara Township Board of Supervisors unanimously adopted an ordinance at its regular monthly August 2026 meeting that revises the residential forest district and governs data centers. The data center provisions are among the more complete in this dataset, and they are specific enough to be usable. The ordinance ESTABLISHES DEFINITIONS for data centers and places them as an ALLOWED USE IN THE INDUSTRIAL DISTRICT, with limitations including a 35-FOOT MAXIMUM HEIGHT and a 300-FOOT SETBACK FROM RESIDENTIAL properties. Three submission requirements go further than most: the applicant must produce DOCUMENTATION FROM AN ELECTRIC SERVICE PROVIDER THAT WILL SERVE THE DATA CENTER, a TRAFFIC STUDY, and an EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT PLAN. The electric-service documentation is the notable one. It requires a developer to demonstrate that power is actually available and committed before the township approves anything — which addresses the problem several jurisdictions in this dataset have run into from the other end, where a facility is approved locally and the grid consequences surface afterwards. Fort Worth, Texas reached the same idea by a different route, requiring evidence of PUCT or ERCOT interconnection approval at multiple stages of development review. A 35-foot height cap is also notably low for an industrial use and would constrain building form considerably.
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In effect
Hurlock MD three-year data center moratorium (2026)
Hurlock, MD · Effective August 10, 2026 · Hurlock, Md. — three-year moratorium on data centers (August 2026)
The Town of Hurlock approved a THREE-YEAR MORATORIUM on data centers at an August 2026 meeting. Three years places Hurlock among the longest local pauses recorded in this dataset — behind only Independence County, Arkansas at five years, and ahead of the two-year measures in Lawrence County, Illinois and elsewhere. For a town of Hurlock's size on Maryland's Eastern Shore, a three-year horizon is less an interim study period than a decision to keep the question closed for the foreseeable future. That is worth stating plainly rather than treating a three-year 'temporary' measure as equivalent to a six-month one. Hurlock sits in a notably active corner of Maryland. This dataset separately records Cambridge, also in Dorchester County, adopting a one-year moratorium in August, and Federalsburg described in reporting as the first Eastern Shore community to act. Prince George's County has a two-year moratorium indexed. Maryland is also the state whose Governor, Wes Moore, said in September 2026 that he would 'absolutely sign' a statewide data center moratorium if one reached his desk in 2027 — so the local measures are accumulating in a state where the executive has signalled he would ratify them at the state level.
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In effect
Portage IN Technology Campus district data center rules (2026)
Portage, IN · Effective August 4, 2026 · City of Portage, Ind. — Technology Campus district zoning ordinance governing data centers (adopted August 4, 2026)
Portage City Council unanimously adopted a data center ordinance on August 4, 2026 that is the most numerically specific municipal instrument in this dataset. It creates a new zoning classification — the Technology Campus, or TC, district — and makes it the ONLY zoning code that can be applied to a data center project. A developer cannot site a data center anywhere else in Portage, full stop. Inside the TC district the numbers are these: noise may not exceed 55 DECIBELS; no structure may exceed 65 FEET in height; and a facility must sit at least 500 FEET back from a residential district, or 200 feet from other zoned properties. The council tightened two of those on the floor, cutting the noise limit from the 65 decibels originally proposed and the height from 75 feet — so the adopted rules are stricter than what the Planning Commission recommended. And for the largest facilities there is a second gate: a project meeting the HYPERSCALE definition — electrical load exceeding 50 megawatts OR a campus greater than 500,000 square feet — must obtain planned development approval within the TC district, which is a discretionary council decision rather than an administrative one. The TC district is described as established for technology-focused business, light manufacturing and data service usage. Portage is in Porter County in northwest Indiana, where nearly a third of Indiana counties had moved to restrict data centers by July 2026.
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In effect
London KY two-year data center moratorium (2026-16)
London, KY · Effective August 3, 2026 · City of London, Ky. — Ordinance 2026-16 (Aug. 3, 2026)
The London City Council passed a two-year moratorium on new data centers inside city limits, approving the second reading of Ordinance 2026-16 on August 3, 2026 by a 5-1 vote. Councilman Bruner cast the lone no vote. The ordinance bars new data centers through September 30, 2028, and lets the London Planning Commission extend the pause by up to one additional year if it needs more time. City leaders said the point is to give officials room to study what data centers have actually done to communities across Kentucky and the country, including effects on infrastructure and local resources. At two years, this is one of the longest municipal data center moratoriums in Kentucky — most of the state's 2026 wave ran six months to a year. London is the seat of Laurel County in southeastern Kentucky.
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In effect
Lakeland FL data center + 50MW load moratorium (Ord. 26-018)
Lakeland, FL · Effective August 3, 2026 · City of Lakeland, Fla. Ordinance 26-018 (Aug. 3, 2026)
Lakeland commissioners voted 4-3 on August 3, 2026 to impose a one-year moratorium on new data centers and on any other business expected to draw at least 50 megawatts of electricity. Two things make this ordinance unusual. First, it is not limited to data centers as a category — the trigger is the 50 MW load, so a large industrial customer of any description is caught by the same rule. Second, and more significant, it reaches beyond the city's borders. The moratorium applies both inside Lakeland and to projects located outside the city that seek service from Lakeland's utilities. That matters because nearly 70% of Lakeland Electric's service area lies outside the city limits, where Lakeland has no land-use authority at all but can still be asked to power a project. Using utility service as the hook lets the city reach developments it cannot zone. The pause took effect immediately, stopping the city from accepting or reviewing applications while staff write permanent rules covering power and water demand, noise, public safety, environmental effects, impacts on nearby properties, infrastructure costs, jobs and tax revenue. It can run up to twelve months but commissioners may end it sooner if the work finishes. The vote was contested: Commissioners Stephanie Madden, Mike Musick and Ashley Troutman were strongly opposed to the language and voted no.
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In effect
Cary NC 18-month data center moratorium (2026)
Cary, NC · Effective August 1, 2026 · Town of Cary, N.C. — 18-month moratorium on all data center development (approved August 2026)
Cary Town Council unanimously approved an EIGHTEEN-MONTH moratorium on ALL data center development in August 2026. The length puts it among the longest local pauses in this dataset, and the town was specific about what the time is for: staff will study power demand and grid capacity, water consumption, noise and vibration effects, and site design and buffering, while engaging the community and coordinating with regional partners. Staff will give periodic progress updates to council, with a decision on a permanent ordinance expected in February. The carve-out is the part worth copying. The moratorium expressly excepts 'enterprise, small-scale, collocated data processing equipment, such as server rooms at offices or hospitals' DRAWING LESS THAN ONE MEGAWATT of demand. That is a cleanly drafted exclusion: it is defined by function and by a hard numerical threshold, so a hospital's server closet is unambiguously outside the moratorium while anything of real scale is inside. Several other jurisdictions in this dataset had to solve the same problem by describing the excluded use in words alone, which leaves argument room. Not everyone supported it — Cary resident Michael Morris, who works in IT, told council the town has been about growth for twenty years and the moratorium 'sends the wrong message,' while accepting that a data center should not go next to a supermarket. Cary is in Wake County, in the Research Triangle, where Durham County and the City of Durham also paused data centers in 2026.
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In effect
Federalsburg MD three-year data center moratorium (2026)
Federalsburg, MD · Effective August 1, 2026 · Town of Federalsburg, Md. — three-year data center moratorium (August 2026)
Federalsburg council members passed a THREE-YEAR moratorium on data centers at their August 2026 meeting, and separate reporting describes the town as the first Eastern Shore community to go that far. Three years is at the outer edge of every local pause in this dataset. Only five Arkansas counties, the Town of Highlands in New York, and a reported five-year moratorium in Independence County, Arkansas match or exceed it — and it is two to three times the ceilings municipal officials have stated on the record elsewhere in this record. A Minnesota city development director told her council twelve months was that state's statutory maximum; a Wisconsin village administrator described twelve months plus a single six-month extension, adding that 'moratoriums are not meant to be a tool to prohibit something forever'; a Nevada city attorney assessed them as defensible for twelve to eighteen months before permanent code changes become necessary. Maryland municipal authority is not addressed in the located source and may be broader. The point is flagged rather than resolved, but it matters here more than usual: Federalsburg sits inside Caroline County, whose commissioners adopted a ONE-year moratorium for unincorporated areas on July 21, and alongside Ridgely, which adopted ONE year within its own limits. Three neighbouring governments reached terms differing by a factor of three for the same use in the same county within weeks — which suggests the term is being set by local appetite rather than by any shared reading of what the law permits.
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In effect
Cherry Hill NJ data center prohibited-use ordinance (2026)
Cherry Hill, NJ · Effective July 28, 2026 · Cherry Hill Township, N.J. — zoning ordinance designating data centers a non-permitted use (adopted July 28, 2026)
Cherry Hill Township Council unanimously passed an ordinance on July 28, 2026 listing data centers as a non-permitted land use anywhere within the township. This is a permanent zoning prohibition, not a pause. The drafting detail that makes it workable is the carve-out: the ordinance distinguishes the now-forbidden data centers — facilities used for artificial intelligence or cloud storage — from the small server rooms a standalone business keeps for its own file storage, which remain permitted. Without that line a literal prohibition on 'data centers' would sweep in every dentist's office with a server closet. Because the use is simply not permitted, a developer who wanted to build one in future would need a use variance from the township zoning board, which is generally the hardest land-use approval to obtain in New Jersey. Mayor David Fleisher framed the decision as pre-emptive: 'We don't think that Cherry Hill should be a guinea pig… while the technology is evolving, we wanted to be proactive and make sure that we eliminated a problem before it became one.' Cherry Hill is one of a large group of South Jersey and statewide municipalities that formally banned large-scale data centers during 2026 — by late August more than fifty New Jersey towns had prohibited the use outright, the densest municipal ban wave in the country.
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In effect
Hillsboro OR data center/battery storage moratorium (2026)
Hillsboro, OR · Effective July 27, 2026 · City of Hillsboro, Ore. — City Council special meeting action, 2026-07-27 (120-day moratorium)
The Hillsboro City Council voted at a special meeting Monday, July 27, 2026 to enact a 120-day moratorium blocking new or expanded data center and battery energy storage projects, running until at least November 24, 2026. The move follows concern over high electricity and water use, noise, tax incentives, and the limited number of jobs data centers create — and comes the same week local leaders, businesses, and farmers joined a separate lawsuit against the city and county over a series of enterprise-zone tax-break approvals for 17 proposed data-center projects.
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In effect
Cottage Grove WI 18-month data center moratorium (2026)
Cottage Grove, WI · Effective July 20, 2026 · Village of Cottage Grove, Wis. — 18-month data center moratorium (adopted July 20, 2026)
The Village of Cottage Grove board unanimously passed an eighteen-month moratorium on new data center development on July 20, 2026 — one of the longest local pauses in this dataset. Board members said the point is to give the village time to gather information about data center impacts and develop best practices for regulating them, and also to give a new Dane County task force studying data centers, on which Cottage Grove has representation, time to produce guidance for municipalities. The reason the village needed its own moratorium at all is the useful part. Dane County had already passed a temporary pause on data centers, but that county pause DOES NOT APPLY to municipalities that have their own zoning codes — and Cottage Grove does. A county-level moratorium in Wisconsin, as in many states, reaches only the territory the county actually zones. Any reader assuming a county pause covers everything inside the county's boundaries would be wrong, and the gap is exactly where an incorporated village sits. Wisconsin had a wide moratorium wave in 2026: temporary bans were in effect in Green, Dodge, Door and Manitowoc counties, Madison had passed one, Chippewa County adopted a twelve-month pause in August and Eau Claire County began drafting in September. Democratic state lawmakers had proposed a statewide moratorium in February 2026.
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In effect
Foster Twp PA data center zoning restriction (2026)
Foster Township, PA · Effective July 8, 2026 · Foster Township, Luzerne County, Pa. zoning ordinance amendment (adopted 2026-07-08); no ordinance number on the document
The amendment defines 'Data Center' — expressly including cryptocurrency mining, blockchain transaction processing and server farms — and 'Data Center Accessory Use', then sets the use table so data centers are NOT permitted in the B-2, B-3, A-1, C-1, I-1, I-2 and S-1 districts, and are allowed only as a conditional use in the AEO energy overlay district. New supplemental regulations impose a 2,000-foot setback from all property lines and from sensitive uses, a 40-foot height cap inclusive of roof-mounted equipment, a mandatory enclosing buffer, preliminary, interim and as-built acoustical studies enforcing a 65 dB(A) daytime limit, a vibration study, a water feasibility study with drawdown testing of wells within 3,000 feet and DRBC approval where thresholds are met, DEP/SEO wastewater approval, electric-provider capacity certification, NFPA 30/70/75/76/110/855 compliance, a fire-department-accepted Emergency Response Plan with applicant-funded municipal cost mitigation, and a decommissioning plan backed by bond or escrow reviewed bi-annually.
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In effect
Knoxville TN one-year large data center moratorium (2026)
Knoxville, TN · Effective July 7, 2026 · City of Knoxville, Tenn. — emergency ordinance imposing a one-year data center moratorium (adopted July 7, 2026; expires July 7, 2027)
Knoxville City Council unanimously passed an emergency ordinance on July 7, 2026 imposing a one-year moratorium on the permitting, construction or development of large data centers requiring ten megawatts or more of power within the city. It took effect immediately — that is what the emergency designation does — and runs through July 7, 2027. The ordinance's recitals are unusually explicit about why, and they go well beyond the usual electricity-and-water framing. They cite the sheer size of some data centers, their effects on neighborhoods, the demand they place on energy and water, Knoxville's own greenhouse gas emission reduction goals, and the fact that data centers often provide few jobs in the community. That last point is worth noting: the jobs-versus-burden trade is the argument developers usually make to a city, and Knoxville wrote its skepticism of that trade into the instrument. The Mayor framed the pause as protecting clean air and clean water. Knoxville acted two weeks after Knox County, the surrounding county government, adopted its own one-year moratorium on June 23, 2026 at a lower 5 MW threshold — two separate governments, two separate measures, two different trigger levels covering overlapping ground.
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In effect
Holyoke MA AI data center ban (2026)
Holyoke, MA · Effective June 17, 2026 · City of Holyoke, Mass. — Zoning Ordinance amendment banning data centers (June 2026)
Holyoke became the first community in Massachusetts to ban AI data centers. The City Council voted 9-4 in June 2026 to amend the city's zoning ordinance, adding a definition of 'Data Center' and providing that the use is not allowed anywhere in the city; Mayor Joshua Garcia signed it the following day. The prohibition reaches AI data center development above 12 megawatts. What makes the ordinance interesting is the carve-out. Holyoke is home to the Massachusetts Green High Performance Computing Center, founded more than a decade ago by a consortium of universities for scientific research and running almost entirely on carbon-free power. Rather than ban the category and force an awkward conflict with a facility the city values, the ordinance lets that center continue operating under the same 12-megawatt cap. So the measure is not opposition to computing infrastructure as such — it distinguishes between a research facility on clean power at modest scale and speculative hyperscale AI development, and permits only the former. Holyoke's own electricity comes largely from municipal hydropower, which is part of why the city attracted the computing center in the first place.
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In effect
Madison NJ Ordinance 27-2026 (Data Center Ban)
Madison, NJ · Effective June 16, 2026 · Borough of Madison, N.J., Ordinance No. 27-2026 (adopted June 16, 2026)
The Borough of Madison, New Jersey's Common Council unanimously adopted Ordinance 27-2026 on June 16, 2026, amending Chapter 195 of the borough's land development code to prohibit data centers as a use within the borough. Madison operates its own municipal electric utility and cited energy, water, and infrastructure concerns. The borough is the latest in a growing wave of New Jersey municipalities to permanently ban data center facilities.
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In effect
Monterey Park Data Center Ban (Measure NDC)
Monterey Park, CA · Effective June 2, 2026 · Monterey Park, Cal., Measure NDC (June 2, 2026); Municipal Code amendment
Monterey Park voters approved Measure NDC on June 2, 2026, amending the city's Municipal Code to permanently prohibit data centers anywhere in the city. The ban followed a 45-day moratorium the City Council first adopted January 21, 2026 (later extended to January 21, 2027) after a proposed data center drew strong neighborhood opposition. With voter approval, the prohibition is now a permanent citywide ban.
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- Millville NJ Data Center Ban (May 19, 2026) · Millville, NJ · In effect
- Aurora IL data center standards + biometric privacy ordinance (O26-021, 2026) · Aurora, IL · In effect
- Fayetteville GA Data Center Prohibition · Fayetteville, GA · In effect
- Town of Warrenton VA Zoning Ordinance Amendment · Warrenton, VA · In effect
- Ottawa KS proposed data center ban ballot initiative (2026) · Ottawa, KS · Proposed / pending
- Augusta GA permanent data center ordinance (Sept 2026) · Augusta, GA · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Village of Horseheads NY data center moratorium (2026) · Village of Horseheads, NY · In effect
- Berkeley Heights NJ data center ban (2026) · Berkeley Heights, NJ · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Hardyston NJ data center ban (2026) · Hardyston Township, NJ · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- East Brunswick NJ data center zoning ban (Ord. 26-21) · East Brunswick, NJ · In effect
- St. Louis MO data center zoning and tax incentive ban (2026) · St. Louis, MO · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Atlanta Beltline/MARTA Data Center Ban · Atlanta, GA · In effect
- Saginaw MI data center zoning ordinance (2026) · Saginaw, MI · In effect
- Oakland CA 45-day data center moratorium (Oct. 2026) · Oakland, CA · In effect
- Raleigh NC proposed 6-month data center moratorium (2026) · Raleigh, NC · In effect
- Evansville IN 180-day data center moratorium (Oct. 5, 2026) · Evansville, IN · In effect
- Ellensburg WA 6-month emergency data center moratorium · Ellensburg, WA · In effect
- Dixon CA 45-day data center and BESS moratorium · Dixon, CA · In effect
- Leominster MA data center + battery storage moratoriums (2026) · Leominster, MA · In effect
- St. Bernard OH 12-month data center moratorium (2026) · St. Bernard, OH · In effect
- East Whiteland Twp PA data center zoning Ord. 385-2026 · East Whiteland Township, PA · In effect
- Thornton CO 1-year data center moratorium (2026) · Thornton, CO · In effect
- Salem OR 120-day data center moratorium (Res. 2026-40) · Salem, OR · In effect
- Commerce City CO 6-month data center moratorium (2026) · Commerce City, CO · In effect
- Newport NC data center moratorium (2026) · Newport, NC · In effect
- Gary IN mayoral executive order data center moratorium (2026) · Gary, IN · In effect
- Arcata CA 45-day data center moratorium (2026) · Arcata, CA · In effect
- Richmond CA 45-day data center moratorium (2026) · Richmond, CA · In effect
- Loveland CO 12-month data center moratorium (2026) · Loveland, CO · In effect
- Marina CA 45-day data center moratorium (2026) · Marina, CA · In effect
- West Mahanoy Township PA curative amendment, data centers and solar (2026) · West Mahanoy Township, PA · In effect
- Statesville NC 180-day data center moratorium (2026) · Statesville, NC · In effect
- Gilroy CA interim urgency data center moratorium (2026) · Gilroy, CA · In effect
- Woodburn OR 120-day data center moratorium (2026) · Woodburn, OR · In effect
- Bemidji MN one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Bemidji, MN · In effect
- Lower Mount Bethel Township PA data center ordinance (2026) · Lower Mount Bethel Township, PA · In effect
- Marysville KS 12-month data center moratorium (2026) · Marysville, KS · In effect
- Dixfield ME 180-day data center moratorium, town meeting vote (2026) · Dixfield, ME · In effect
- Southport NC 15-month data center moratorium (2026) · Southport, NC · In effect
- Waterloo IA 3-month data center moratorium · Waterloo, IA · In effect
- Warren OH one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Warren, OH · In effect
- Clearfield UT data center moratorium (2026) · Clearfield, UT · In effect
- Tucson AZ large-scale data center zoning ordinance · Tucson, AZ · In effect
- Winchester KY one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Winchester, KY · In effect
- Eureka CA data center moratorium and 20,000 sq ft cap direction (2026) · Eureka, CA · In effect
- Miamisburg OH nine-month data center moratorium (2026) · Miamisburg, OH · In effect
- Salida CO 12-month data center moratorium Ord. 2026-19 · Salida, CO · In effect
- Cambridge MN one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Cambridge, MN · In effect
- Montgomery Township PA data center curative regulations (2026) · Montgomery Township, PA · In effect
- Murray KY data center regulations (2026) · Murray, KY · In effect
- Marshalltown IA 4-month data center moratorium · Marshalltown, IA · In effect
- Escondido CA 45-day data center moratorium (2026) · Escondido, CA · In effect
- Elkhart IN data center and battery storage moratorium (2026) · Elkhart, IN · In effect
- Palm Springs Data Center Moratorium (2026) · Palm Springs, CA · In effect
- Lake Elsinore CA 45-day data center moratorium (2026) · Lake Elsinore, CA · Expired
- Ligonier Township PA data center zoning regulations (2026) · Ligonier Township, PA · In effect
- Camden NY local data center moratorium (2026) · Camden, NY · In effect
- Fairfield IA data center development pause ordinance (2026) · Fairfield, IA · In effect
- Indianapolis data center moratorium (Council 23-1 Aug 10; MDC 6-0 Aug 19; effective) · Indianapolis, IN · In effect
- Patterson CA data center moratorium extension Ord. 890 (2026) · Patterson, CA · In effect
- Greensboro NC 180-day data center moratorium (2026) · Greensboro, NC · In effect
- Virginia Beach 12-month data center moratorium (2026) · Virginia Beach, VA · In effect
- Chesapeake VA data center zoning ordinance (2026) · Chesapeake, VA · In effect
- Norristown PA data center ordinance (2026) · Norristown, PA · In effect
- Marshall MI one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Marshall, MI · In effect
- Angels Camp CA 45-day data center moratorium · Angels Camp, CA · Status unknown
- Renton WA one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Renton, WA · In effect
- Kalamazoo MI data center moratorium (2026) · Kalamazoo, MI · In effect
- Bloomingdale GA 6-month data center moratorium (2026) · Bloomingdale, GA · In effect
- Louisville Metro six-month data center moratorium (O-135-26) · Louisville, KY · In effect
- La Crosse WI city 18-month data center moratorium (2026) · La Crosse, WI · In effect
- Bellevue WI 12-month data center moratorium (2026) · Bellevue, WI · In effect
- Eastport ME 180-day underwater data center moratorium (2026) · Eastport, ME · In effect
- Waxhaw NC 12-month data center moratorium (ORD2026014) · Waxhaw, NC · In effect
- Commerce CA 45-day data center urgency ordinance (2026) · Commerce, CA · Expired
- Chicago data center executive order (2026) · Chicago, IL · In effect
- Pinellas Park FL one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Pinellas Park, FL · In effect
- Pere Marquette Township MI data center moratorium (2026) · Pere Marquette Township, MI · In effect
- Nicholasville KY six-month data center moratorium (2026) · Nicholasville, KY · In effect
- Tucson Data Center UDC Standards (adopted 2026) · Tucson, AZ · In effect
- Jeffersonville IN one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Jeffersonville, IN · In effect
- Falls Township PA curative amendment on data centers (2026) · Falls Township, PA · In effect
- Town of Tonawanda NY data center moratorium LL 2-2026 · Town of Tonawanda, NY · In effect
- Corunna MI data center zoning ordinance (2026) · Corunna, MI · In effect
- Farmville NC 12-month data center moratorium (2026) · Farmville, NC · In effect
- Athens OH data center moratorium Ord. 70-26 (2026) · Athens, OH · In effect
- Town of Janesville WI data center moratorium (2026) · Town of Janesville, WI · In effect
- Elk River, MN — one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Elk River, MN · In effect
- Auburn NY one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Auburn, NY · In effect
- Cle Elum WA Data Center Moratorium (2026) · Cle Elum, WA · In effect
- Amherst OH Nordson campus data center variance denial (2026) · Amherst, OH · In effect
- La Conner WA data center moratorium (2026) · La Conner, WA · In effect
- Toccoa GA data center moratorium (2026) · Toccoa, GA · In effect
- Clearcreek Township OH one-year data center permit moratorium (2026) · Clearcreek Township, OH · In effect
- Otsego MN one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Otsego, MN · In effect
- Canton OH data center zoning chapter (2026) · Canton, OH · In effect
- North Richland Hills TX data center SUP regulations (2026) · North Richland Hills, TX · In effect
- Westerly RI one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Westerly, RI · In effect
- Ludlow KY one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Ludlow, KY · In effect
- Palo IA EU-1 Data Center District (2026) · Palo, IA · In effect
- Nashville Permanent Data Center Zoning (500k sq ft cap + BZA approval) · Nashville, TN · In effect
- Chamblee GA data center moratorium (2026) · Chamblee, GA · In effect
- Ellsworth WI temporary data center ordinance (2026) · Ellsworth, WI · In effect
- Nashville Data Center Moratorium (effective through Dec 1, 2026) · Nashville, TN · In effect
- Warner Robins GA six-month data center moratorium (2026) · Warner Robins, GA · In effect
- Brookhaven NY 18-month data center moratorium (eff. July 16, 2026) · Brookhaven, NY · In effect
- Pensacola FL 1-year large-scale data center moratorium (eff. July 16, 2026) · Pensacola, FL · In effect
- Pocatello ID data center CUP denial upheld (July 16, 2026) · Pocatello, ID · In effect
- Clayton OH 365-day data center moratorium (2026) · Clayton, OH · In effect
- Cleveland OH 3-month data center moratorium (eff. July 15, 2026) · Cleveland, OH · In effect
- East Greenbush NY 6-month data center moratorium (eff. July 15, 2026) · East Greenbush, NY · In effect
- Panama City and Bay County FL data center moratoria (2026) · Panama City, FL · In effect
- Lawrence KS 24-month data center moratorium (eff. July 14, 2026) · Lawrence, KS · In effect
- Topeka KS 12-month data center moratorium (eff. July 14, 2026) · Topeka, KS · In effect
- Indio CA data center urgency moratorium extension (July 14, 2026) · Indio, CA · In effect
- Proposed 183-day moratorium on data center construction and · Jackson, MS · In effect
- Haring Charter Township MI data center moratorium (eff. July 13, 2026) · Haring Charter Township, MI · In effect
- Hagar Township MI data center moratorium (eff. July 13, 2026) · Hagar Township, MI · In effect
- Shelbyville TN Data Center + Crypto Moratorium · Shelbyville, TN · In effect
- Wentzville MO 6-month data center application moratorium (early July 2026) · Wentzville, MO · In effect
- Roanoke City VA Data Center Special Exception Zoning Ordinance · Roanoke, VA · In effect
- Broomfield CO 18-month data center moratorium, Ord. 2313 (eff. July 7, 2026) · Broomfield, CO · In effect
- Federal Way WA Data Center Moratorium (2026) · Federal Way, WA · In effect
- Springville AL 1-year data center moratorium (eff. July 6, 2026) · Springville, AL · In effect
- Summit NJ AI Data Center Ban (proposed) · Summit, NJ · In effect
- Topeka KS 1-year data center moratorium + utility restriction (2026) · Topeka, KS · In effect
- Chewelah WA emergency data center moratorium (2026) · Chewelah, WA · In effect
- Minneapolis Data Center Moratorium · Minneapolis, MN · In effect
- Carbondale IL one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Carbondale, IL · In effect
- One-year citywide data-center moratorium (Spokane) · Spokane · In effect
- Spokane Data Center Moratorium (1 year) · Spokane, WA · In effect
- Peosta IA 6-month data center moratorium (Resolution 2026-49) · Peosta, IA · In effect
- Holly Springs NC 12-month data center moratorium (2026) · Holly Springs, NC · In effect
- Fort Payne AL data center moratorium (6-month, June 2026) · Fort Payne, AL · In effect
- Desert Hot Springs CA data center moratorium (2026, extended to 2 yrs) · Desert Hot Springs, CA · In effect
- Garden City GA 6-month data center moratorium · Garden City, GA · In effect
- Broken Arrow OK data center moratorium (2026) · Broken Arrow, OK · In effect
- Bourbonnais IL data center moratorium to Jan. 31, 2027 · Bourbonnais, IL · In effect
- South Strabane Data Center Ordinance · South Strabane Township, PA · In effect
- Seattle Data Center Moratorium · Seattle, WA · In effect
- McMinnville Data Center Moratorium · McMinnville, TN · In effect
- Flint MI 12-month data center moratorium · Flint, MI · In effect
- Charlotte Data Center Moratorium · Charlotte, NC · In effect
- Edmond Data Center Moratorium · Edmond, OK · In effect
- Scarborough Data Center Moratorium · Scarborough, ME · In effect
- Imperial CA Data Center Moratorium · Imperial, CA · Expired
- Augusta GA data center moratorium (ended Sept 15, 2026 — permanent ordinance enacted) · Augusta, GA · Expired
- Grove City OH 12-Month Moratorium on High-Density Computing Facilities · Grove City, OH · In effect
- Grove City OH 1-year data center moratorium (2026) · Grove City, OH · In effect
- Westbrook ME 180-day data center moratorium (2026) · Westbrook, ME · In effect
- Reno Data Center Moratorium · Reno, NV · In effect
- Brunswick Data Center Moratorium · Brunswick, ME · In effect
- Cedar Hill Data Center Moratorium · Cedar Hill, TN · In effect
- Merrillville IN one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Merrillville, IN · In effect
- Bloomington Data Center Moratorium · Bloomington, IL · In effect
- Denver Data Center Moratorium · Denver, CO · In effect
- Normal Data Center Moratorium · Normal, IL · In effect
- Jackson Township OH One-Year Moratorium on Data Centers · Jackson Township, OH · In effect
- Baltimore Data Center Moratorium · Baltimore, MD · In effect
- Ephrata Twp PA data center rules (2026) · Ephrata Township, PA · In effect
- Lysander Data Center Moratorium · Lysander, NY · In effect
- Boardman Township OH One-Year Moratorium on Data Centers · Boardman Township, OH · In effect
- Dayton OH data center moratorium (180-day, Apr 2026) · Dayton, OH · In effect
- Washington Township OH data center moratorium (360-day, Apr 2026) · Washington Township, OH · In effect
- Ravenna OH one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Ravenna, OH · In effect
- Bangor Data Center Moratorium · Bangor, ME · In effect
- Massillon OH Data Center Moratorium (60-day stay; extended through Aug 21, 2026) · Massillon, OH · Expired
- Pleasant Township OH data center moratorium (2026) · Pleasant Township, OH · In effect
- Lowell MA 360-day data center moratorium (2026) · Lowell, MA · In effect
- City of Fayetteville GA Ordinance 26-O-12 · Fayetteville, GA · In effect
- Rochester Hills MI data center moratorium extended (2026) · Rochester Hills, MI · In effect
- Eagan MN data center moratorium (Feb 2026 - Feb 2027) · Eagan, MN · In effect
- Vienna Township OH 180-Day Data Center Moratorium · Vienna Township, OH · Expired
- Hubbard Township OH One-Year Moratorium on Data Centers · Hubbard Township, OH · In effect
- Hogansville GA data center moratorium (extended through ~Oct 8, 2026) · Hogansville, GA · Expired
- City of Covington GA 180-Day Data Center Moratorium · Covington, GA · Expired
- The Dalles OR Aquifer Storage and Recovery System + Google Water Infrastructure · The Dalles, OR · In effect
- Social Circle GA 90-Day Data Center Moratorium (extended; lifted upon code adopt · Social Circle, GA · Expired
- Mesa AZ Data Center Zoning Ordinance (Ord. No. 5957) · Mesa, AZ · In effect
- Phoenix DC Zoning Standards · Phoenix, AZ · In effect
- Johnson City Data Center Moratorium · Johnson City, TN · In effect
- Goodyear AZ Microsoft Updated Development Agreement (air-cooling mandate) · Goodyear, AZ · In effect
- Groton Data Center Zoning Limit · Groton, CT · In effect
- Chandler Data Center Noise Ordinance · Chandler, AZ · In effect
- Chandler AZ Ordinance No. 5033 · Chandler, AZ · In effect
- Sharon PA data center zoning guardrails (July 2026) · Sharon, PA · In effect
- Akron OH data center review process (2026) · Akron, OH · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Twinsburg OH 12-month data center moratorium (2026-065) · Twinsburg, OH · In effect
- Port Angeles WA six-month data center moratorium (2026) · Port Angeles, WA · In effect
- San Francisco, CA — 45-day data center moratorium (approved Oct. 6, 2026) · San Francisco, CA · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Fairfield AL data center moratorium (2026) · Fairfield, AL · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Harpersville AL 6-month data center moratorium (2026) · Harpersville, AL · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Pinson AL 1-year data center moratorium (2026) · Pinson, AL · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Prichard AL 6-month data center moratorium (2026) · Prichard, AL · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Westover AL 6-month data center moratorium (2026) · Westover, AL · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- North Port FL 18-month data center moratorium (2026) · North Port, FL · In effect
- Dubuque IA 6-month hyperscale data center moratorium (2026) · Dubuque, IA · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Galesburg IL 180-day data center moratorium · Galesburg, IL · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Mattoon IL self-renewing data center moratorium (2026) · Mattoon, IL · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Troy IL data center moratorium extended to Mar 2027 · Troy, IL · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Zionsville IN 1-year data center/renewables moratorium (2026) · Zionsville, IN · In effect
- Saco ME data center moratorium (2026) · Saco, ME · In effect
- Dearborn MI 6-month data center moratorium (2026) · Dearborn, MI · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Gibraltar MI 12-month data center moratorium (2026) · Gibraltar, MI · In effect
- Pontiac MI data center moratorium (2026) · Pontiac, MI · In effect
- Port Huron Township data center moratorium (Ord. 257) · Port Huron Township, MI · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Portage MI data center and BESS moratorium (2026) · Portage, MI · In effect
- North Mankato MN 12-month data center moratorium (2026) · North Mankato, MN · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Woodbury MN 1-year data center moratorium (2026) · Woodbury, MN · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Lancaster PA data center zoning rules (2026) · Lancaster, PA · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Rapho Twp PA data center zoning rules (2026) · Rapho Township, PA · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- West Hempfield Twp PA data center zoning ordinance (2026) · West Hempfield Township, PA · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Spanish Fork UT Title 15 data center onsite-generation ordinance (2026) · Spanish Fork, UT · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Janesville WI city 12-month data center moratorium (2026) · Janesville, WI · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Ozark MO data center zoning rules · Ozark, MO · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Pierce Township OH data center moratorium · Pierce Township, OH · In effect
- Lochbuie CO data center moratorium (2026) · Lochbuie, CO · In effect
- Portland OR data center NDA resolution (2026) · Portland, OR · In effect
- Forest Park GA 90-day data center moratorium (2026) · Forest Park, GA · In effect
- Savannah GA 155-day large data center moratorium (10 MW / 200K sq ft threshold) · Savannah, GA · In effect
- Chillicothe OH data center moratorium, rescinded (2026) · Chillicothe, OH · Repealed / replaced
- Anniston AL 12-month data center moratorium (Resolution 26-R-97) · Anniston, AL · In effect
- Rockford IL six-month data center moratorium (2026) · Rockford, IL · In effect
- Cle Elum WA emergency data center moratorium (2026) · Cle Elum, WA · In effect
- Albany GA 12-month data center moratorium · Albany, GA · In effect
- Columbus IN city data center BZA oversight ordinance (2026) · Columbus, IN · In effect
- Paris TN temporary data center moratorium (2026) · Paris, TN · In effect
- 120-day moratorium on new data center applications · Springfield, Missouri · In effect
- Inver Grove Heights MN data center moratorium amended under lawsuit (2026) · Inver Grove Heights · In effect
- Temporary Moratorium on New Data Center Applications · Homewood, AL · In effect
- One-Year Moratorium on Data Centers · Cullman, AL · In effect
- Superior WI Data Center Moratorium (1-year) · Superior, WI · In effect
- San Marcos citywide data center ban (Land Use Matrix amendme · San Marcos · In effect
- Milton GA 30-day data-center moratorium (June 2026) · Milton, Georgia · In effect
- Emergency 365-day moratorium on new data centers (>20 MVA) · Seattle · In effect
- Resolution setting Seattle data-center impact-study framework · Seattle · In effect
- Hyperscale Data Center Zoning Ordinance (20-point community · Birmingham, AL · In effect
- Moratorium on data center permits, development plans and zon · Lexington-Fayette Urban County, KY · In effect
- One-Year Moratorium on New Data Center Development (Ordinanc · Leeds, AL · In effect
- Smithfield Town Council data center zoning ban ordinance · Smithfield, RI · In effect
- Industrial Zoning Ordinance Regulating Data Centers · Little Rock, AR · In effect
- Six-month moratorium on data centers >350,000 sq ft (Minneapolis) · Minneapolis · In effect
- Indianapolis-Marion County data-center pause resolution · Indianapolis/Marion County · In effect
- One-year moratorium on data center development · Cave City, KY · In effect
- OKC emergency data-center moratorium through end of 2026 · Oklahoma City · In effect
- Data center moratorium (4 months with extension option) · Lenox Township, MI · In effect
- Madison WI Data Center Moratorium (1-year) · Madison, WI · In effect
- Temporary moratorium on new data centers · New Orleans, LA · In effect
- 180-day data center moratorium · Springfield Township, MI · In effect
- Zoning Amendment Allowing Data Centers as Industrial Use · Bessemer, AL · In effect
- Tucson Project Blue Rejection · Tucson, AZ · In effect
- Austin AI Governance Resolution (2025) · Austin, TX · In effect
- Memphis xAI Colossus Permits · Memphis, TN · In effect
- Logan Ordinance 26-12 - Temporary Land Use Ordinance (data c · Logan · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Town of Clay one-year data center moratorium and Battery Ene · Town of Clay · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- City of Lynn Haven one-year AI data center moratorium · City of Lynn Haven · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Sherman Township 12-Month Moratorium on Data Centers · Sherman Township, Huron County, Michigan · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Somerville 18-Month Data Center Moratorium · Somerville, Tennessee · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Lewisville Data Center Special-Use Permit Ordinance · Lewisville, Texas · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Westfield One-Year Data Center Moratorium · Westfield, Massachusetts · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Solon Township six-month moratorium on data center proposals · Solon Township (Kent County) · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Berlin Township Data Center Ordinance · Berlin Township, Wayne County · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- One-year moratorium on new data centers · Burien · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- 180-Day Curative Amendment Moratorium on Data Center Zoning · Hazle Township, Luzerne County · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- One-Year Moratorium on New Data Center Development · Asheville · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- 180-Day Moratorium on Data Center Development · Brookville Borough · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- SU-47 Special-Use Data Center Zoning District Ordinance · Indianapolis / Marion County · Proposed / pending
- Boulder City NV appeal vs BLM data center approval (authorized July 14, 2026) · Boulder City, NV · Blocked / in litigation
- Peru IN temporary data center moratorium (2026) · Peru, IN · In effect
- Aurora CO resolution directing data center regulations, moratorium rejected (2026) · Aurora, CO · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Missoula MT data center zoning definition amendment (2026) · Missoula, MT · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Raton NM data center moratorium (rejected, 2026) · Raton, NM · Expired
- Valley View SD v. Archbald / Project Gravity data center suit (2026) · Archbald, PA · Blocked / in litigation
- Keller HOA / City of Keller v. Westlake TX data center suit (2026) · Westlake, TX · Blocked / in litigation
- Cheyenne Microsoft data center annexation challenges (2026) · Cheyenne, WY · Blocked / in litigation
- Warrenton Amazon Data Center Fight · Warrenton, VA · Blocked / in litigation
- Indianapolis Data Center Pause Resolution · Indianapolis, IN · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Memphis xAI Permit Challenge · Memphis, TN · Blocked / in litigation
- Nottingham Planning Board pursuing a local data center morat · Nottingham, NH · Proposed / pending
- 91-day pause on data center development · Sanford, ME · Proposed / pending
- Chicago data center energy/water benchmarking disclosure (SO2026-0027165) · Chicago, IL · Enacted (not yet in effect)
- Indianapolis temporary data center moratorium (committee advanced July 13, 2026) · Indianapolis/Marion County · Proposed / pending
- Spring City TN 2-year data center moratorium (final reading July 30, 2026) · Spring City, TN · Proposed / pending
- Catawissa Township PA Data Center Overlay, Ord. 01-2026 (hearing July 30, 2026) · Catawissa Township, PA · Proposed / pending
- Minneola FL 1-year data center moratorium (final reading July 21, 2026) · Minneola, FL · Proposed / pending
- Indianapolis MDC data center special zoning proposal (July 2026) · Indianapolis, IN · Proposed / pending
- Columbus OH proposed data center regulations — water, sewer, decommissioning (vote expected Aug 24+) · Columbus, OH · Proposed / pending
- Fairfax IA permanent ban on high-impact data centers (no end date; second reading pending) · Fairfax, IA · Proposed / pending
- Fort Worth TX 90-day moratorium process + Data Center Commission (Aug 11, 2026) · Fort Worth, TX · Proposed / pending
- Fresno CA 10-year data center prohibition (proposed) · Fresno, CA · Proposed / pending
- Nashville/Davidson County temporary moratorium on data centers · Nashville-Davidson County · Proposed / pending
- Fayetteville data-center ordinance (public hearing Aug 10, 2026) · Fayetteville, North Carolina · Proposed / pending
- Town of Beloit WI data center moratorium resolution (2026) · Town of Beloit, WI · Proposed / pending
- Poway CA AI data center ban ordinance, first reading (2026) · Poway, CA · Proposed / pending
- Aurora CO evaporative cooling ban ordinance, first reading (2026) · Aurora, CO · Proposed / pending
- Chicago 12-month data center moratorium ordinance (proposed 2026) · Chicago, IL · Proposed / pending
- Fort Wayne IN proposed data center moratorium (R-26-09-17) · Fort Wayne, IN · Proposed / pending
- Lawrence KS data center special-use-permit text amendment (proposed) · Lawrence, KS · Proposed / pending
- Hopkinsville KY proposed data center zoning amendment (2026) · Hopkinsville, KY · Proposed / pending
- Salisbury MD 1-year data center moratorium (proposed, 2026) · Salisbury, MD · Proposed / pending
- Ypsilanti MI proposed data center zoning amendment (2026) · Ypsilanti, MI · Proposed / pending
- Harmony MN proposed data center ordinance (2026) · Harmony, MN · Proposed / pending
- Kirksville MO proposed data center zoning ordinance (2026) · Kirksville, MO · Proposed / pending
- Newark NJ proposed one-year data center moratorium (2026) · Newark, NJ · Proposed / pending
- Buffalo NY proposed 2-year data center moratorium (2026) · Buffalo, NY · Proposed / pending
- Ilion NY proposed 2 MW large-load moratorium (LL 3 of 2026) · Ilion, NY · Proposed / pending
- Potsdam NY proposed 12-month data center/crypto moratorium, LL 2026-5 (2026) · Potsdam, NY · Proposed / pending
- Amherst OH proposed data center moratorium (A-26-38, 2026) · Amherst, OH · Proposed / pending
- Columbia Borough PA data center zoning (2026) · Columbia Borough, PA · Proposed / pending
- Plains Twp PA proposed data center energy/technology overlay (2026) · Plains Township, PA · Proposed / pending
- Gallatin TN proposed six-month data center moratorium · Gallatin, TN · Proposed / pending
- Memphis TN data center moratorium Ord. 5982 (pending final reading) · Memphis, TN · Proposed / pending
- Denton TX proposed 90-day data center moratorium (2026) · Denton, TX · Proposed / pending
- Lubbock TX proposed 90-day data center moratorium (2026) · Lubbock, TX · Proposed / pending
- Suffolk VA proposed citywide data center prohibition (2026) · Suffolk, VA · Proposed / pending
- De Pere WI proposed 1-year large data center moratorium (2026) · De Pere, WI · Proposed / pending
- Milwaukee WI proposed one-year data center moratorium · Milwaukee, WI · Proposed / pending
- Bethlehem PA data center zoning amendment (first reading) · Bethlehem, PA · Proposed / pending
- Mount Pleasant SC proposed 120-day data center moratorium · Mount Pleasant, SC · Proposed / pending
- Brighton CO one-year data center moratorium (first reading) · Brighton, CO · Proposed / pending
- South Bristol NY proposed data center / AI facility ban · South Bristol, NY · Proposed / pending
- Grand Junction CO proposed 1-year data center moratorium · Grand Junction, CO · Proposed / pending
- Northfield MN Ord. 1098 data processing facility standards (first reading) · Northfield, MN · Proposed / pending
- North Berwick ME data center ban referendum (Nov. 2026) · North Berwick, ME · Proposed / pending
- City of Manassas VA Data Center Zoning Standards · Manassas, VA · Proposed / pending
- San Antonio DC Water Disclosure · San Antonio, TX · Proposed / pending
- Indianapolis DC Zoning · Indianapolis, IN · Proposed / pending
- Indianapolis SU-47 District (draft) · Indianapolis, IN · Proposed / pending
- Calipatria CA Data Center Moratorium (introduced) · Calipatria, CA · Proposed / pending
- Wausau WI Data Center Zoning (proposed) · Wausau, WI · Proposed / pending
- Alhambra CA Measure DB data center ban (ballot) · Alhambra, CA · Proposed / pending
- Perris data center ban (proposed) · Perris, CA · Proposed / pending
- Edgerton KS suit to void data center ban petition · Edgerton, KS · Blocked / in litigation
- El Dorado KS data center/BESS ban ballot question · El Dorado, KS · Proposed / pending
- Brooks v. Wilmington OH emergency rezoning challenge (2026) · Wilmington, OH · Blocked / in litigation
- Lowell MA Markley data center diesel generator injunction (2026) · Lowell, MA · Blocked / in litigation
- State ex rel. Kidd v. Clinton Cty. Bd. of Elections (Ohio 2026) · Wilmington, OH · Blocked / in litigation
- Eagan Capital v. City of Eagan (data center moratorium) · Eagan, MN · Blocked / in litigation
- DC Blox v. Metro Nashville data center moratorium suit · Nashville, TN · Blocked / in litigation