Monday, May 18, 2026

Opposition Hits 70%. The Siting Playbook Just Got Three Items Longer.

Public opposition to AI datacenters hit 70% in the latest Gallup, and the template Mansfield, Massachusetts just used to cap projects at 2 MW is already circulating to planners in Georgia and Ohio. Texas keeps the ERCOT and behind-the-meter advantage, but the developers who shape acoustic limits, water sourcing, and benefit-sharing locally are the ones who'll still be building when the moratoria wave reaches I-35.

Today's Lead

Community opposition is hardening into a measurable constraint on datacenter siting, and the developers who'll win the next 24 months are the ones treating power, water, and acoustics as the first three checkboxes rather than the last three. Gallup pegs national opposition to local datacenters at 70-71%, twenty points worse than nuclear, while local activism has blocked or delayed $64 billion in U.S. projects between May 2024 and March 2025.

Texas remains the structural winner thanks to ERCOT, the PUCT, and behind-the-meter gas economics. But Brazoria County's "washing machine" complaints and Vantage's 1,200-acre, 1.4 GW Frontier campus outside Abilene show the friction is already here.

[1]·[2]·[3]

Power

Behind-the-meter is the Texas thesis, and Chevron just put a price tag on it.

Chevron's Energy Forge One subsidiary is seeking $227 million in JETA tax savings over ten years for a West Texas gas plant tied to a Microsoft exclusivity deal, part of roughly 100 GW of gas capacity nationally under development for datacenter-only service per Global Energy Monitor. Permian operators are already building 7.65 GW of on-site gas dedicated to datacenters. Co-location bypasses 7-10 year interconnection queues, which is why Michael Brown at Franklin Templeton told CNBC the next $7 billion datacenter belongs in the U.S. or China, not Europe (where industrial power runs 4x U.S. rates).

Risk: if JETA-subsidized fossil generation for private hyperscale tenants becomes a political flashpoint, the abatement math that makes behind-the-meter pencil out gets rewritten mid-cycle. Developers using JETA quietly fared better than those generating Wired headlines.

[4]·[5]·[6]

Power

Nuclear demand is real; the workforce isn't.

ERCOT projects a 70% surge in grid demand by 2031, with more than 70 datacenters operating or planned between Temple and San Antonio. Comanche Peak and South Texas Project together generate over 5,000 MW, nowhere near sufficient. Derek Haas at UT Austin notes most current nuclear professionals entered the field before new construction halted in the early 1980s. Separately, NextEra is reportedly in talks to acquire Dominion Energy for roughly $66 billion, consolidating generation and transmission to chase anchor-tenant contracts.

Risk: developers who don't engage UT and Texas A&M training pipelines now will find their nuclear PPAs theoretical. Generation commitments without skilled operators are paper.

[7]·[8]

Water

Texas datacenters are projected to use 49 billion gallons in 2025, rising to 399 billion by 2030.

Two-thirds of recent U.S. datacenter projects landed in water-stressed regions. A single hyperscale facility consumes up to 5 million gallons daily. Meta's Newton County, Georgia site alone takes 10% of county water supply. Amazon settled a $20.5 million class action with Oregon residents in March over water depletion. Utah's Stratos project, 9 GW next to a shrinking Great Salt Lake, drew Governor Cox to walk back support on X.

Risk: developers who haven't sourced recycled or non-potable supply before site selection are betting on a permitting environment that's getting tighter, not looser. Water-first design isn't optional in the Permian or anywhere west of I-35.

[6]·[9]·[10]

Sources we cited

10 articles across 10 publishers · 122 reviewed today

[1]Fortune
Americans would rather live near a nuclear power plant than a data center—by a lot
May 15, 2026·Gone are the days of the Cold War, of nuclear anxiety, of those old animated “Duck and Cover” PSAs we were shown in school: Americans are no…
[2]The AI Economy
Nobody Wants a Data Center Next Door
May 18, 2026·This story originally appeared in the May 15 issue of The AI Economy on LinkedIn. Read the full issue here. The AI infrastructure buildout …
[3]Chron
Texans say AI boom sounds like a 'washing machine' that never turns off
May 17, 2026·ROUND ROCK, TEXAS: The Sabey Data Center in Round Rock, Texas on Monday, Aug. 11, 2025. (Aaron E. Martinez/The Austin American-Statesman via…
[4]The Cool Down
Chevron wants a Texas tax break for a data center power plant that would emit more CO2 than Jamaica
May 18, 2026·Even if the data center cannot receive the incentive directly, the fossil fuel infrastructure built to support it might. Chevron is seeking…
[5]CNBC
High energy prices could derail Europe’s AI race with U.S. and China
May 18, 2026·Europe wants to position itself as a leader in AI and compete with the U.S. and China — but experts told CNBC that its soaring energy prices…
[6]Energy News Beat
The data center doomers must be defeated – But not at the cost of our family farms and water
May 17, 2026·The Washington Examiner was right on target in its May 16, 2026, editorial: the “data center doomers” — the coalition of socialists, Democra…
[7]Austin American-Statesman
Texas’ nuclear boom needs workers as data centers drive demand - Austin American-Statesman
May 18, 2026·Texas is home to two nuclear power plants: the Comanche Peak Nuclear Power Plant (pictured) and the South Texas Project. The state is lookin…
[8]POWER Magazine
Reports Say NextEra in Talks to Acquire Dominion Energy
May 17, 2026·NextEra Energy, among the largest electric utilities in the U.S., is reportedly in talks to acquire Virginia-based Dominion Energy. POWER ha…
[9]grist.org
Utah’s fragile desert could feel like the Sahara if America’s biggest data center gets built
May 18, 2026·Plans for a celebrity-backed “hyperscale” data center in rural Utah, so massive that it would consume more than double the state’s current e…
[10]Rolling Stone
What’s Up With Mr. Wonderful’s Utah Data Center?
May 17, 2026·Earlier this month, Republican county commissioners fast-tracked approval for a 40,000-acre data center in northwest Utah, blocking public c…

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