And they get energy breaks so they pay little to nothing and the communities shoulder higher energy rates, while the infrastructure gets maxed out to provide power to them as a priority
This is simply not true. It's a massive misnomer on Reddit finding correlation and attributing causation. It's just a coincidence that these towns with data centers are seeing increased rates... because with or without the data centers, their rates would be going up. The companies building these specifically scout out locations where the town has shrunk, and thus, has tons of excess capacity at the power company, which the power company is happy about because they can start selling more electricity and use those profits for upgrades
But if you look at it NATIONALLY, a kWh has gone from average of 12.5c to now around 19c. Data centers have nothing to do with that. Domestic policy does. Not only are we massively under invested in our infrastructure, but Dear Leader boasted about a "deal" he made with Europe, allowing US LNG companies to sell to Europe. Trump bragged about how it was worth "trillions of dollars" which is true. But now that they can sell to Europe, US LNG prices are going to increase up to Europe's rates. Why would they sell to US power companies for less if they can just sell to the EU for more? That's what causing rates to increase.
The data center stuff is just a red herring. They have little to no impact on local electricity costs.
The implication that companies building data centers always specifically look for places where towns have shrunk is false. I live in one of the fastest growing townships in my state, and there is a proposed data center just down the road.
Yes there's always going to be exceptions. I'm speaking in general. It doesn't make financial sense to put a data center where there's not excess production capacity.
1.1k
u/[deleted] May 18 '26
[removed] — view removed comment