As power-hungry data centers proliferate, states are searching for ways to protect utility customers from the steep costs of upgrading the electrical grid, trying instead to shift the cost to AI-driven tech companies. (Dana DiFilippo/New Jersey Monitor)

Two environmental groups are warning state residents about the amount of energy and water that is set to be used following the construction of AI data centers in southern Wisconsin. 

In an analysis released Tuesday, Clean Wisconsin found that two data centers approved for construction in Ozaukee and Racine counties will consume enough energy to power 4.3 million homes — nearly double the 2.8 million housing units in the state. 

The first AI data warehouse, operated by Microsoft, is set to open next year in Mount Pleasant. The company has promised it will support 500 jobs. The $3.3 billion project is located at the site initially planned for Foxconn’s massive manufacturing plant. 

Further north in Ozaukee County, Denver-based Vantage Data Systems has acquired 700 acres of land in rural Port Washington. The company has planned a campus that will hold 11 data center buildings and five substations, according to concepts approved by the local government. 

Clean Wisconsin’s analysis found that these two projects will require a combined 3.9 gigawatts of power and hundreds of thousands of gallons of water to keep the buildings cooled. 

“To put this in perspective, that is more than three times the power production capacity of Wisconsin’s Point Beach nuclear plant,” Paul Mathewson, Clean Wisconsin science program director, who conducted the analysis, said in a statement. “And because only two of the data center projects have disclosed their power needs, we know this is really just a fraction of what the energy use would be if all those data centers are ultimately built.”

The power needs of the two sites are just the tip of the iceberg for the energy and water needs of data centers, which house the servers used to host chatbots such as Chat GPT, stream video and use social media. Microsoft has plans for a smaller data center in Kenosha County. Work is also underway on a data center on 830 acres in Beaver Dam reportedly for Facebook owner Meta. In addition, a Virginia-based company has eyed a site in Dane County, Wisconsin Rapids has plans for a $200 million data center and Janesville is seeking to build a center in a former General Motors assembly plant. 

A proposed project in Caledonia has been delayed following  local resistance to the project’s proposed rezoning of 240 acres of farmland. The community’s plan commission postponed a July vote on the proposal until later this month. 

Environmental advocates say local officials and the state’s power companies are rushing to attract data centers to Wisconsin based on the ambiguous promise of jobs without accounting for the effect they could have on a community’s water sources and energy needs. Increases in the amount of power used by the state could result in the state relying more heavily and for longer periods on non-renewable sources of energy and raise energy rates for households. 

‘More questions than answers’

“If data centers come to Wisconsin, they must benefit  — not harm — our communities. But right now, we have far more questions than answers about their impacts. How much energy and water will a project use? How will those demands be met? Will there be backup diesel generators on site and how often will they be fired up for testing? Our communities don’t have the transparency they need and deserve,” Chelsea Chandler, Clean Wisconsin’s climate, energy and air director said. 

Data centers also often emit a constant humming sound as the servers work inside, creating an irritating noise pollutant for neighbors.

Both the Mount Pleasant and Port Washington projects are close to Lake Michigan, raising further complications about the centers’ use of water and the protection of the Great Lakes. The Foxconn site in Mount Pleasant was already at the center of a controversial plan to divert 7 million gallons of water per day from Lake Michigan. 

“There has been very little transparency about the amount of water that will be used on site at these proposed data center campuses. Add to that a lack of transparency about energy use, and it’s impossible to know what the impact on Wisconsin’s water resources will be,” Sarah Walling, Clean Wisconsin’s water and agriculture program director said. “Communities need to know what the on-site demand will be on the hottest, driest days of the year when our water systems are most stressed. And we need to understand how much water will be needed off site to meet a data center’s enormous energy demands.”

Demanding water-use information from Racine

Earlier this week, Midwest Environmental Advocates filed a lawsuit against the city of Racine for records about the Mount Pleasant center’s projected water usage. Water for the center will be provided by the Racine Water Utility under an agreement with the village of Mount Pleasant. 

The lawsuit, filed on behalf of Milwaukee Riverkeeper, is seeking to force Racine to hand over information about projected water usage requested through an open records request in February. In a news release, MEA noted that many companies constructing data centers across the country require that local governments sign non-disclosure agreements. 

The legal advocacy group noted that data centers can use as much water as a small to medium sized city and the public has a right to know the scale of water use. 

“Wisconsin law requires public officials to respond to public records requests ‘as soon as practicable and without delay.’ Yet more than six months after making their request, our clients are still waiting,” MEA legal fellow Michael Greif said. “This blatant disregard for the Public Records Law violates their rights and deprives them of the transparency they deserve. Community members have a right to know how much water a data center will use before it is built.”