Data Center Watch: local opposition blocked or delayed 17 US data center projects worth $98B in Q2 2025, vs. 16 projects worth $64B from May 2024 to March 2025
A new report finds that local opposition to data centers skyrocketed in the second quarter of this year.
WiredMolly Taft
Context & Ripple Effects
This report marks an acceleration from the preceding period, when 16 U.S. projects valued at $64 billion were blocked or delayed. It fits growing town-level scrutiny of proposed facilities over their water and electricity demands.
The issue did not remain isolated: later coverage showed major operators including [[a:1162135|Digital Realty, QTS, and NTT Data acknowledging shortcomings in responding to local opposition]].
First-order effects
Developers behind the 17 affected projects face delayed or halted construction timelines, putting the associated $98 billion of planned investment at risk of not proceeding as scheduled.
Local governments and residents gain greater leverage over project approvals as opposition becomes a material constraint on proposed capacity.
Second-order effects
Data-center operators will need to treat community engagement, power and water planning, and local permitting as core development work rather than downstream approvals.
Customers seeking new capacity may face a narrower or slower-to-deliver set of locations when projects encounter local resistance.
Third-order effects
If opposition continues to scale, access to community support and approvable power-and-water plans could increasingly determine where U.S. compute capacity can be built.
The pattern raises compute execution risk: announced infrastructure investment may become less reliable as a proxy for deliverable capacity.
The trend: Data-center expansion is shifting from a primarily capital-and-power buildout challenge toward one increasingly constrained by local political consent.
This @mollytaft.com piece is the closest I've seen to an interrogation of who 10a Labs are and why they're doing this - but note how 10a Labs frame the consequences of opposition as lost investment in $$, and that drives how opposition is reported: — www.wired.com/story/the-da.…
If I had to predict a high-impact story that is flying under the radar now but will play a big role in next year's major federal and state elections in the U.S., it'll be electricity prices and data centers. Easy-to-understand affordability and corruption story.
Hallelujah. — “Opposition blocked or delayed $98 bn in projects from March to June of 2025 alone—8 projects, including two in IA and KY, were blocked in those 3 months, while 9 were delayed...a $17 bn development [near Atlanta], was put on hold...following significant pushback …
NEW from me: a new report found that national resistance to data centers skyrocketed between March and June of this year—especially in red states like Georgia and Indiana:
This will become a major issue in Europe too - in some places it already is. Data centres drive up the price of elecricity and suck up scarce water resources. The profits that are generated by Big Tech flow out of Europe largely untaxed. — www.wired.com/story/the-da...
The Data Center Resistance Has Arrived — “Residents have complained for years about a series of rate hikes from the PSC. But during Hubbard's campaigning, he noticed another topic coming up again and again with his future constituents.” — https://www.wired.com/...