Data centres get too hot for Texas politicians
Texas Republican governor Greg Abbott used to get electricity users into the state by any means necessary. He rolled out the red carpet for the bitcoin miners in 2021. But by 2024, Dallas-Fort Worth was already the second-biggest data centre market in the US after Northern Virginia. And the Texas…
Texas Republican governor Greg Abbott used to get electricity users into the state by any means necessary. He rolled out the red carpet for the bitcoin miners in 2021. But by 2024, Dallas-Fort Worth was already the second-biggest data centre market in the US after Northern Virginia. And the Texas ERCOT power grid was having trouble getting power across the state. In 2026 ERCOT has 474 GW of applications to connect. Over 90% are from aspiring data centres. ERCOT’s all-time record power output was 91 GW just last month. [Texas Tribune] So Abbott has told ERCOT and the Public Utility Commission of Texas to pause all data centre plans pending an audit of each plan. He wants to know which plans have government assistance, which are bringing their own power and water, how they’re reducing local impact, and who will actually own the data centre. [press release] In June, Abbott had already required that developers fully fund their power connection infrastructure. Though it’s not clear that means the data centres will actually pay the entire bill. [press release; Texas Observer] The new audit has stopped a pile of data centre plans in their tracks. [E&E] Why’s Abbot doing this? Because in Republican Texas, even Fox News has Abbott only 1% ahead of his Democratic opponent, Gina Hinojosa. And you bet data centres are a major campaigning point. Hinojosa’s called Abbott’s letters “inadequate” and is calling for a proper legal moratorium on new data centres altogether. [Fox; press release] Video — PodcastSource: Pivot to AI — Published — Category: Business