New York Becomes First State To Impose Data Center Moratorium (reuters.com)
- Reference: 0184458814
- News link: https://news.slashdot.org/story/26/07/14/1520222/new-york-becomes-first-state-to-impose-data-center-moratorium
- Source link: https://www.reuters.com/world/new-york-becomes-first-state-impose-data-center-moratorium-2026-07-14/
> The construction ban will apply to data centers that use 50 megawatts or more of power, officials in the governor's office said. During the moratorium, the state's Department of Environmental Conservation will not issue any discretionary permits not already deemed complete, the governor's office said. Instead, Hochul directed state officials to develop a Generic Environmental Impact Statement to ensure that new data centers coming online are held to "consistent standards," as well as examine the potential environmental impacts of the construction and operation of data centers in the state. The ban will be lifted once the state finalizes those standards, according to Hochul's office.
[1] https://www.reuters.com/world/new-york-becomes-first-state-impose-data-center-moratorium-2026-07-14/
A data center in NY (Score:1)
that's terrible.
Re: (Score:3)
Yeah, I guess that it's pretty easy to pass a data center ban in a state where nobody really wants to build a data center. The real estate in New York is too expensive for building a data center, and the electricity is too expensive to run it and the labor too expensive to build it. And even if you were willing to pay that, the taxes are going to be high and the environmental regulations will be a pain.
Now, if you were able to pass a data center ban in a state like Virginia or Texas... THAT would be meaning
Re: (Score:2)
Isn't New York not a state located quite close to the Canadian border? Would that not be a good location for energy-availability and -security? Building is something you do once. Having access to power from US and Canada, will make for a continuous functioning datacenter. Which is a quite important factor in profitable exploitation of such any datacenter.
Re: (Score:2)
> Yeah, I guess that it's pretty easy to pass a data center ban in a state where nobody really wants to build a data center. The real estate in New York is too expensive for building a data center, and the electricity is too expensive to run it and the labor too expensive to build it.
NYS is actually a large state, with a number of rural communities (and lots of cheap empty space). And being near the St. Lawrence river and its hydroelectric plants could, in theory, provide cheaper power. That is not to say one cannot do better elsewhere (especially since some states are willing to give long term tax abatements). And it is not as if a few organizations have not recently built (or in various stages of building) a few fabs in the upstate region which consume upwards of a few hundred mega
Curious (Score:4, Interesting)
How charging EVs will break the power grid but operating gigawatt slop datacenters is essential?
Re: (Score:2)
Your curiosity may get you deported.
Won't it have popped by a year from now? (Score:1)
If the governor wants New Yorkers to be able to get cheap RAM at AI bankruptcy auctions, shouldn't they build the datacenters now?
If you wait a year to give permission, the bubble will have popped long before any hardware ever gets shipped, so the bankruptcy auction won't have anything to sell.
Re: (Score:2)
Nah, I don't think that will help the acceleration. Building them out keeps the money shifting and prolongs the frauds. I don't know how we get ram relief at this point. The economy will collapse entirely before that's allowed to happen.
Re: (Score:2)
> If you wait a year to give permission, the bubble will have popped long before any hardware ever gets shipped, so the bankruptcy auction won't have anything to sell.
It just moves the source of the sales -- if the datacenter (AI or not) bubble pops, then all the chip-fab companies that are doubling down on RAM production for these datacenters will have production capacity they no longer have a market for at inflated prices, so rather than have to take a complete writeoff on their expanded production lines, they'll likely start pushing RAM at fire-sale prices in order to recover at least some of the money they'd poured into new production lines in the "line goes up" beli
Praise be (Score:3, Interesting)
Despite electing a communist mayor in their largest city, it seems like the state government is making a solid good move here. We already have way more capacity than China. I high doubt any of the current model hosting providers are anywhere near capacity or have growth curves even approaching them. It's all investment fraud and NY is doing the right thing to put a hard break on the newest Tulip Mania
Re: (Score:2)
Speaking of communists, how much of how many major american companies has Mondami caused the city of New York to purchase?
Now answer that same one for your orange hero trump and remind me which one has implemented more communism.
Re: (Score:2)
It's a great experiment that terrifies republicans. If the mayor fails then they can claim how awful his woke commie policies were. If he succeeds then they have bigger problems. There have been a number of democratic socialist politicians in the past. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Democratic_Socialists_of_America_public_officeholders
Re: (Score:1)
> It's a great experiment that terrifies republicans. If the mayor fails then they can claim how awful his woke commie policies were. If he succeeds then they have bigger problems. There have been a number of democratic socialist politicians in the past. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
No need to be terrified, this is how it's supposed to work. Different States trying different things as the incubators of Democracy. Competing for resources like citizens and businesses. If NYC's mayor pulls it off they will attract more resources. If he doesn't well then those resources will move to other States and NYC will have a bad time. I've read history, and considering how horribly things like price controls have worked in the past, instead of terrified, I'm mostly thankful to NYC and CA for se
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Democratic_Socialists_of_America_public_officeholders
AI datacenters are differnet (Score:2)
Lots of comments about all of the open space in current DCs. Do those current DCs support the kind of loads an density that AI wants to require? Maybe not.
I'm not advocating for more datacenters and certainly not advocating for AI. But an AI datacenter needs much higher power density and a traditional DC. AI wants 2x to 10x the power density.
[1]https://techplustrends.com/pow... [techplustrends.com]
[1] https://techplustrends.com/power-requirements-ai-data-centers/
Re: (Score:2)
> Lots of comments about all of the open space in current DCs. Do those current DCs support the kind of loads an density that AI wants to require?
I have spent time inside a number of datacenters (from smaller, to very large). Most do not have the power (or cooling) capacity to be good locations for the newer AI racks (some existing buildings may not even have the floor loading capacity (heavy racks need serious floor support)). Sure, some could be retrofitted, but it is probably going to be cheaper to build new than gut an existing building and replace all the power and cooling infrastructure. And that would presume that the current location is vi
Debatable rationale (Score:2)
"As data center development threatens to hike up utility bills, deplete our natural resources, and create uncertainty for New Yorkers, it's my responsibility to take action and lead,"
Okay... Well, you can pass a law saying datacenters have to bear the full cost of the infrastructure they need, that takes care of utility bills. I'm not sure what natural resources she's talking about, the aforementioned law would cover any natural gas and water use, so what's left? These don't pollute the air, and there i
New Jersey and Connecticut are close enough (Score:2)
They can just build more there to support NYC.
Well that's easy. (Score:2)
Build two 49 MW centers, 6 months and 6 miles apart.
Drug dealers solved the money laundering casino reporting threshold problem decades ago.
We don't need anymore datacenters world wide (Score:2)
The human created internet has plenty of room, all these "new" data centers are storage for slop. It's time to force AI companies to clean up the mess.
Re: We don't need anymore datacenters world wide (Score:2)
Humans create a lot of slop that needs to be stored in data centers too. Do people really need to take so many pictures?
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> Humans create a lot of slop that needs to be stored in data centers too. Do people really need to take so many pictures?
You could delete all of that and AI companies would still need/want nearly as many new data centers. Besides, pictures are real things, made by people, capturing a moment in time - what else is as deserving of that space? Meanwhile, a single tiktok can be 20mb-500mb, while the average iPhone photo is 3-4mb (and uploads thereof are usually MUCH smaller).
Re: We don't need anymore datacenters world wide (Score:2)
Sure, but putting storage online is cheaper both initially and ongoing than putting a bunch of GPGPU online, and in both power consumption and dollars. It can take up just as much space but use an order of magnitude less electricity, therefore be quieter, and have no one care