Those Data Centers Are Evil ... Sez China

One of my many guilty pleasures is YouTube. At this time of year, however, it gets annoying. Political ads grow like weeds, and it's often the same one, over and over. Politicos present grainy images of their opponents, who look like mob figures from the '60s. Many have also latched onto the widespread opposition to those evil data centers, which will end the world as we know it.  Just a few years ago, warehouses were the enemy. Now, they're OK. It's those damn data centers. Throw in AI, and it's the apocalypse.

According to one recent poll, if polls can still be believed, anywhere from 61% to 75% of Americans oppose them. Whether reliable or not, they influence how politicians think, and this is pretty evident in the political ads. Move over, affordable housing. The backlash against server farms has become a focal point in this year's midterms. 

Governor Josh Shapiro, who would like to be President Josh Shapiro, has obviously noticed those polls. The man who once embraced data centers and put them on a "fast track" for development now warns about predatory computer center developers. He's also released ads, complete with those grainy black and white images, portraying Stacy Garrity, his opponent in next year's gubernatorial gauntlet, as the wicked witch of those evil data centers.

All she needs is a broom. 

Locally, they are universally unpopular in both counties. A few months ago, I attended a packed house in Lower Mount Bethel for what was supposed to be an informational meeting but nearly turned into a lynch mob. Of nearly 500 people who came, every single person who spoke was opposed to data centers. 

I more recently attended a meeting in Upper Mount Bethel, although I got tired of hearing the same nonsense over and over and left after about an hour.

One of the loudest voices opposed to data centers in the slate belt is Tom Gilmour, who last year supposedly was being groomed as a Dem County Council candidate. His wife Courtney, who I'm told is a very nice lady, is the county party vice chair. At both of the meetings I attended, I heard him rail against data centers. In a recent Facebook post, he attacked Supervisors who were willing to at least consider the proposal. You know, be open-minded. He slammed Township Solicitor Ron Karasek for barely looking up from whatever notes he was taking. Gilmour is apparently unaware that the role of a municipal solicitor is to provide legal advice to Supervisors, not dictate policy. Gilmour also attacked Ron Angle, one of two data center supporters, as the "local pariah." Angle has often been willing to go against the current, and more often than not, has been proved right. But as the Good Book says, no prophet is acceptable in his own country. 

Speaking of countries, there's one place outside the U.S. where data centers are A-OK. China. While the Gilmour gang is out there with pitchforks and torches at municipal meetings, China is quietly expanding its AI data center push. The Middle Kingdom is pouring $295 billion into them. I imagine that NIMBYs there are few and far in between. 

China's data center expansion should worry us. Like it or not, these server farms are critical national infrastructure with (1) military and defense applications that provide the computer power to protect us; (2) provide artificial intelligence and intelligence gathering; and (3) enable us to engage in geopolitical and strategic competition with countries like China, which plans to double its data centers by 2030. 

Like it or not, people like Tom Gilmour are unwitting tools of China. According to Open AI, the People's Republic of China has been engaged in covert influence to promote the narrative that data centers are raising electricity prices for average families. I by no means suggest that we would love data centers were it not for China's propaganda. Of course, there have been terrible data centers. 

Pennsylvania Senator Dave McCormick, who recently was a guest on Aaron McLain's excellent School of War Podcast, said that the data center debate has moved dramatically over the past 12 months. He indicated that both China and Russia are trying to influence the debate (like they try to influence elections) because leading in AI requires energy and computing power. He also acknowledged that some of these developers have done a terrible job promoting these computer banks. 

He recommends that communities consider a covenant between the developer and the community to (1) protect residents from energy rate hikes, guaranteeing that the hyperscalers will bring more energy than they use; (2) guarantee the use of closed-loop water systems; (3) guarantee tax revenue that makes it possible to reduce property taxes; (4) guarantee that local labor will be used, both to build and work at the center; and (5) a community benefit agreement. As McCormick put it, "What else are you going to do for me? He suggested things like schools, roads, bridges, etc.

When people bray about the data disasters, they neglect to mention Loudon County, Virginia. According to The New York Times, 

Over the past two years, Virginia’s Loudoun County unveiled a sleek $102 million recreation center with multiple pools and hydro massage chairs. It spent $22 million to convert the estate of former President James Monroe into a park. And it opened two new schools, with another under construction.

While many communities are in fiscal crisis, Loudoun is flush. The source of its riches: data centers.

Pennsylvania's other Senator, John Fetterman, agrees with McCormick. 

"AI supremacy and energy dominance underpins our national security," Fetterman said on X in reaction to an article about the artificial intelligence race between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party. "China continues to fuel and benefit from our overreaction. I reject the political pandering and hyperbole over data centers or AI doomsdaying."

I do not think any of these proposals deserve a tax break, but I do think they deserve a fair chance. That's the American way.  

UMBT Conducts "Special" Meeting To Discuss Those Evil Data Centers

About a year ago, warehouses were the bogeymen. Politicians loved to rail against them, and we all lapped it up as we continued ordering toilet paper through Amazon. But there's now an evil more evil monster lurking around every corner - the Data Center. Never mind that they've been with us for decades. Never mind that they are a critical national infrastructure to support both our economy and yes, our national security. They're bad, I tell you. 1,000,000 Facebook groups can't be wrong. 

On Friday night, I could have stayed home to watch President Donald Trump and our betters in the Washingtom press corps insult each other. I opted instead to travel to Angle country, where Upper Mount Bethel Tp was hosting a hastily called "special" meeting in an effort to put the brakes on yet another potential and very evil data center located on Pektor property by both the river and a power plant. 

I arrived a little late, so I missed the remarks made by His Eminence, the Right Reverend Ron Angle. But that's ok. Though Supervisors have limited Angle to three minutes, he manages to inject himself after nearly every speaker anyway, So I got the drift. He thinks a lot of the kneejerk opposition to data centers is misguided. But he's wrong. They're evil, I tell you, the stuff of nightmares and science fiction movies where the noise they emit are really some sort of radio frequenct that turns us into pods. 

I pulled into the parking lot of what is actually the public works garage because the second largest municipality in the goddamn state of Pennsylvania is unable to afford a frickin' municipal building. And that's pretty much because the people who live there - at least the ones with money - don't want anything that could actually help people who are working two or three jobs to make ends meet. The ruling class has decided that data centers are bad, and they know best. A year ago, they thought they were great, much preferable to an evil warehouse, but that was then. 

Before I walked into the garage, I looked over the packed parking lot. It was full of big-ass SUVs and those massive trucks with V-8 engines. Not an ebike in sight. These folks are very environmentally conscious, except when it comes to themselves. 

The reason for the rushed meeting was because the evil data center was just far too willing to work with the township. Supervisor David Friedman, who has previously botched up several negotiating sessions with Tam Pektor, was again spearheading the back-room meetings with Talen Energy. Talen Energy had offered a community benefits agreement of $25 million. Friedman reportedly said, "Make it $50 million and we have a deal," thinking this would be enough to send Talen away with its tail between its legs. Instead, after telephone calls with several Tallen execs, their ambassador came back and agreed.

What little is left of Friedman's head must have exploded. He was sure he had scared them off, but instead, they agreed. now, Friedman would have to break his word again, which obviously doesn't mean much to him as he also once promised to resign and then refused to keep his word. Friedman huddled with John "Voice of (some of) the People" Bermingham and came up with a plan that would scare away that evil data center for good. They decided to propose an amendment to the zoning ordinance that would impose all kinds of conditions on when and where they could be placed.

Good idea, but bad timing. Very bad timing. The evil data center, which I've told you is very bad, filed what is known as a "validity objection." In layman's terms, that is a giant FU to the township. It means that Talen can build a data center wherever the hell it wants and there's not a damn thing the township can do about it. It means that instead of a $50 million community benefits agreement, the township gets zero.

Great job, guys. 

But there was nevertheless a procession of NIMBY speakers who basically are unreservedly opposed to data centers no matter what the benefits might be.  They're bad, I tell you.

One heavy fellow wearing a "Jesus is King" T-shirt and who may have been thinking that Jesus is Burger King, claimed they are "out of control" and "poisoning the water supply." I've got news for Burger King. The people who live in Upper Mount Bethel are already poisoning our water supply with their own shit. Water tests done along the creeks on 611 show unusually high amounts of chemicals that come from residents' refusal to actually build a proper sewer. 

These are the same people who incidentally complain about sludge. 

Now I don't want to leave you with the impression that everyone in Upper Mount Bethel hates data centers. There were a few who said we should at least have an open mind and take a tour or two. 

But when I hear these phonies raise environmental concerns, I have to laugh. Though they are the new bogeyman, consider these facts: You could give up a lifetime of reliance on data centers and AI, and the amount of energy saved would be negligible compared to canceling just one trans-Atlantic flight or switching to a hybrid car; A request to ChatGPT consumes as much energy as one second of a clothes dryer; our 14,000 golf courses consume 550 billion gallons of water a year; we use 3 trillion gallons of water a year just to water our lawns.

But don't let facts get in the way. Data centers are very bad, 

Pa PUC Vice Chair Kim Barrow States Proposed Data Centers Should Bring Their Own Energy Generation

I recently attended a presentation concerning a proposal to build a data center campus in Lower Mount Bethel Tp. Every member of the public who spoke were opposed to the idea While we all rely on data centers to store our Amazon orders or our Facebook pictures, we'd rather not see them. 

Now Northampton County has nothing to do with data centers. But Council member Jeff Warren would very much like to be State Rep. Jeff Warren. He can see which way the wind (hope it's renewable energy) is blowing. So he invited Kim Barrow, Vice Chair of the state Public Utility Commission (PUC) to make a presentation last week. She went on for 30 minutes before Council President Ken Kraft asked her to wrap it up. She went through a lengthy recent history of energy use in Pennsylvania. Her basic message is that any proposed data center should bring its own energy generation. 

Barrow said that Pennsylvania’s electric system is undergoing a dramatic transformation focused on reliability concerns, rising demand forecasts, aging infrastructure, and the pressure being created by extremely large data center projects tied to artificial intelligence and cloud computing.

She began by explaining that Pennsylvania is part of the PJM Interconnection, a 14-state regional transmission organization responsible for coordinating electric supply and reliability throughout much of the eastern United States. Pennsylvania historically has been one of the strongest electricity-producing states in the region, exporting roughly 25% of the electricity it generates.

For many years, Pennsylvania enjoyed relatively flat or declining electricity demand while maintaining a highly diverse energy portfolio that included natural gas, nuclear, coal, hydropower, oil generation, and renewable energy. Because of this diversity and excess generating capacity, Barrow stated she long believed Pennsylvania had excellent “resource adequacy” and strong reliability.

However, she explained that several developments have converged to create what she described as a “perfect storm” of challenges.

Among the major issues discussed were increasingly severe weather events, aging infrastructure, power plant retirements, supply chain disruptions, workforce shortages, cybersecurity threats, and the electrification of transportation and other sectors. She noted that stronger storms are becoming increasingly costly for utilities and more difficult to recover from operationally.

A major turning point in her concerns came during Winter Storm Elliott in December 2022. Barrow described the storm as a near-catastrophic event for the eastern electric grid. During the storm, PJM reportedly lost approximately 47,000 megawatts of generating capacity due to failures across multiple energy sources, including coal, natural gas, and renewable systems.

Coal piles froze, gas compressors malfunctioned in extreme cold, and renewable output declined due to weather conditions. She emphasized that the failures were not isolated to one type of generation resource but occurred across nearly the entire fleet.

According to Barrow, the region came within less than 1,000 megawatts of potentially severe cascading outages. She called it “a miracle” that widespread long-term blackouts did not occur.

One of her strongest messages was the importance of maintaining a balanced energy portfolio. While supportive of renewable energy growth, Barrow stressed that reliability requires maintaining all available resources, including nuclear, natural gas, coal, hydropower, and renewables, particularly during periods of extreme weather stress.

The second major portion of her presentation focused on the rapid rise of hyperscale data centers. Barrow explained that traditional data centers historically consumed between 50 and 200 megawatts of electricity. However, the newest AI-driven facilities are now requesting 1,000 to 2,000 megawatts each — amounts comparable to the output of entire nuclear power plants.

She specifically referenced the restart of Three-Mile Island through agreements tied to Microsoft and discussed Amazon Web Services’ arrangements involving the Susquehanna nuclear facility.

Barrow expressed concern that these enormous new electricity demands are arriving much faster than new generation and transmission infrastructure can be constructed. She warned that if data center growth proceeds unchecked, the grid could face serious reliability risks during future extreme weather events.

She cited PJM capacity auctions as evidence of growing stress within the system. Capacity prices reportedly jumped from approximately $35 per megawatt-day to over $300 per megawatt-day within a short period, creating an estimated $13 billion impact on ratepayers across the PJM region.

Barrow stated that these increases are being driven largely by forecasts of future electricity demand, especially from data centers, and not solely by current consumption levels.

A central theme of her remarks involved protecting residential customers, small businesses, and traditional commercial users from subsidizing the infrastructure costs associated with massive new industrial electricity consumers. She repeatedly stated that hyperscale data centers should “bring their own generation” by financing or constructing additional power sources rather than relying entirely on existing grid capacity.

She explained that the PUC recently issued a “large load model tariff” intended to ensure that large new electric users pay the true costs associated with serving their facilities and do not shift expenses onto ordinary ratepayers.

Data Center Developers Face Tough Crowd in Lower Mount Bethel Tp

Late Thursday afternoon, I barreled up Rte. 611 through Lower Mount Bethel to meet Ron Angle and his son to attend a town hall meeting at Bangor Middle School for a proposed data center next to the PPL power plant. Whenever I approach Angle country, the skies usually turn dark and forbidding. As I get closer to his estate, hailstones start pounding my car and lightening streaks across the sky. Not this time. The weather was unusually balmy, and I was actually able to see the road. I passed no less than six "NO DATA CENTERS ON OUR FARMS" signs along the way, and one of them was actually on a farm. The rest were located at small residences or along public rights of way. I wondered to myself just how many people could possibly feel that strongly. Would they be willing to give up their Thursday evening to attend a meeting during which the developer would outline the proposal? The answer is Yes. There were well over 300 angry people jammed into the school's auditorium, and it quickly became apparent that they would rather see no development at all. They like things the way they are, and I doubt very much that any developer could do anything about it. 

Those developers, by the way, are two of the classiest developers in this area - Mike Perrucci and JG Petrucci. They both have proven records of responsible residential and industrial development, particularly in the Bethlehem area. They brought a team of people from Talen Energy, PPL, to answer questions. They included a former EPA lawyer and even had Slate Belt's very own Lenny Zito, who has represented or sentenced nearly everyone in that area, sitting there as a "legal consultant." Occasionally, when a member of the public would say he or she knew him, Zito would look down from the stage with a knowing smile. 

Governor Ed Rendell's former press secretary acted as facilitator. While she did a fairly good job of making sure everyone could be heard, she did commit a rather serious blunder at the onset. She started the meeting without a pledge of allegiance, which really riled Angle. That's no biggie to me, but I see enough American (and Trump) flags throughout that neck of the county to know he was likely one of several people in an already hostile crowd who got even more upset. 

There's things you just don't do in the slate belt. You don't say professional wrestling is fake. You don't turn down Little Debbie snack cakes. You don't refer to farmland as "underutilized." And you sure as hell don't skip the pledge. If the developers wanted to get on the good side of these people, they should have brought pork rinds or at least a few rolls of duct tape.

John Callahan, Bethlehem's former Mayor, was the pitchman. And don't let him fool you. He's smart as shit. He and Don Cunningham, another of Bethlehem's former Mayors, miraculously prevented Bethlehem from going tets up when Bethlehem Steel suddenly closed. Cunningham gave Bethlehem hope. Callahan gave Bethlehem a casino. (They both were smart enough to rely on Tony Hanna to completely revitalize the city's south side with one of the only TIFs that even I would support.)

Callahan started off by complimenting his audience for being there, saying that they obviously care. Things got ugly for awhile when the mike stopped working, but it was eventually fixed. 

Peter Polt, one of JG Petrucci's top lieutenants, told the audience that they are only in a "very early part of the process," which I'd translate to mean that they're willing to make changes to address public concerns. 

He's proposing a 1.2-gigawatt data center "campus" (meaning more than one) that is sustainable. He said there would be no manufacturing, no warehouses, no heavy traffic, no light pollution, buffering against noise and minimal use of water. He said stories about noisy data centers that gobble up water and power are older facilities and that new technology has greatly reduced both water and power needs.

Another speaker from Talen Energy stated that the average golf course uses about 80 million gallons of water a year, but the data center proposed will use only 60% of that, about 50 million gallons.

Importantly, no groundwater will be used, as Lower Mount Bethel residents rely on ground water for their own needs. Instead, the date center will be cooled by leveraging the existing water infrastructure around the power plant, which uses water from the Delaware River for cooling. The data center will also recycle nonpotable and storm water. He added that water b=pulled in from the river is regulated by the Delaware River Basin Comm'n as well as the DEP..

The power would come from the existing power plant and would in no way reduce power available to local consumers. 

When Polt showed a map of the data center, it became apparent that there likely will be more than one. This seemed to make people angry. When he referred to those lands as "underutilized," people got even more worked up.

The very first public of several dozen speakers from the audience saud that "two companies and developers cannot be trusted to tell the truth about all these details of their builds, how much power, water, etc., they can use, nor the noise levels nor the environmental violations that the center is capable of accomplishing ... .She referred to "what monstrosities have been built in Tatamy, East Allen, Macungie, Nazareth, I could keep going. They are all ugly, no matter how many arbor vitae you plant. ... You say that our land is underutilized. It's farmland. And you guys are just consuming. The only thing you care about is utilizing our land for your profit and your unnamed end user. 

And so it continued.

There was strong community opposition, with many residents expressing concerns about the environmental, social, and economic impacts of the project. Several speakers emphasized their deep connection to the area, noting its rural, agricultural character and the reasons they chose to live there, including peace, natural beauty, and wildlife.

A primary concern raised was the potential environmental impact of the data center. Residents cited worries about excessive electricity usage, water consumption, noise pollution, and harm to local ecosystems, including wildlife such as bald eagles. There is a bald eagle nest on one of the sites being considered, where the developer has proposed a 600" radius around the nest. 

There was also skepticism and distrust toward the developers. They even objected to the way developers were dressed, most with sports jackets. 

In Lower Mount Bethel, the appropriate attire for men is a sports hat or Carhart, preferably both. Women seem to like stretch pants. 

"We don't want to be Bethlehem, we don't want to be Forks Tp," said one resident who prefers driving a little more each day to her job so she can enjoy living near farms. Residents expressed fears that the project would permanently alter the quiet, rural environment they value. Noise from cooling systems, potential industrial expansion, and visual impacts were all cited as threats. Some residents stated clearly that no level of mitigation would be acceptable if it changed the character of the township.

Developers and representatives responded by emphasizing that the project is still in early stages and that no final designs have been determined. They highlighted potential economic benefits, including increased tax revenue and investment, and stated that regulatory processes would govern water usage, environmental protection, and noise standards. They also noted that infrastructure such as the nearby power plant makes the site attractive for development. When they noted the tax benefit, they were accused of bribing residents.

Additional concerns included:

- Lack of early community engagement and communication

- Potential rezoning of agricultural land

- Impacts on neighboring communities and shared natural resources

- Long-term expansion beyond the initially proposed footprint

- Accountability if negative outcomes occur

Several speakers called on local officials to prioritize residents’ voices, uphold environmental protections, and ensure transparency throughout the decision-making process. One key question posed to the developers was whether they would withdraw the project if it is ultimately rejected by local governing bodies, to which the developers responded that they would not pursue a project that is formally denied.