Data centers: Small town politics turn into a national fight

Artificial intelligence is, well, it's everywhere. Not just in our search browsers or on our apps. For many of us, AI is embedded into nearly every aspect of our lives at this point. The tools and tech we use at work, the way we plan our vacations, even how we cook dinner. It's becoming crucial in medical advancement, innovating manufacturing, and solving logistics challenges. Just like the industrial revolution of the late 19th century or the internet boom at the turn of this century, AI is fundamentally changing how we work, how we play, and even how we interact with the world around us. And all this technology? It doesn't just exist in a virtual world, it requires physical infrastructure. Data centers, sprawling sites, sometimes stretching the size of small towns. And there's a race to build out these giant facilities, often in rural communities. Civic and economic leaders are eager to capture the massive investment, the construction jobs, and promises of revitalization in parts of the U.S. where manufacturing and factory jobs used to anchor the local economy. Places like Middleton Township in Northwest Ohio. We're talking about putting a technology investment, the jobs of the future in Northwest Ohio. But while some see data center construction as the promise of jobs and investment, others are leery of the costs to their community. The destruction of farmland, the environmental issues, the air, the water. Especially when the race to be the next technology hub brings up issues around community input and residents who, frankly, don't want this in their backyard. So on this week's On Assignment, our journalists travel to Northwest Ohio to get an up-close look at this debate over the future of AI and the data centers that power it. I'm Christopher Walgesper in Chicago. So I'm here in Middleton Township, Ohio, in the northwest part of the state, just south of Toledo. This is going to be Meta's Bowling Green Data Center. It's a hyperscale data center, over 700,000 square feet on 280 acres of what was up until very recently pretty productive farmland. That's Valerie Volcovici. She covers the intersection of energy and climate here at Reuters. She was joined in Northwest Ohio by one of our video journalists, Eric Cox. Driving up and seeing the Meta data center construction site for the first time was striking. You couldn't really see it all on the ground or even from the air. You know, I flew a drone over it and I reached my drone's limit before I could really even put it all in one shot on the screen. And so it's quite large. And you get another feeling of that, I think, at five o'clock every night when all the cars seem to pour out of there. And it does feel like an inner city traffic scene. Valerie and Eric wanted to understand through their reporting what the data center expansion really looks like. For residents on the ground, I think a lot of people, from what I can see and the many people I've spoken to over the last few days, I think a lot of them think they won't be able to stop this, but they want to try to at least get some guardrails in place and to like really get more transparency from the companies operating. They're trying to use every venue, every meeting like this to try to get officials on the record, to try to get them to answer questions. As we were driving along the metadata construction site, we were kind of looking for some of the homes that were still there as all this banging and clanging was going on. And sure enough, we saw what looked like a swing set and little tricycle inside of a garage and in a backyard at a home directly across the street from the data center construction. And Valerie and I just had an aha moment where we said, oh, that must be a family of young children or something of the sort. Should we stop by? Should we kind of come over unannounced, knock on their door and see what their thoughts, feelings and concerns might be? And boy, are we glad we did because we heard an earful from a very concerned resident named Breanne Kidd. We moved out here six years ago. We wanted to raise our kids in the country, a nice, quiet setting. And that's all kind of being taken away from us now. For so long, she said she's felt like she hasn't had anybody willing to listen to her about her strong worries and concerns about living across the street from the metadata center. Every morning I looked out, there's my beautiful son. I don't see that anymore. Now we see buildings and cranes. And that's the reason why we moved here, things like that, you know, to live in God's country and not Meta's country. These large size data centers, they need the power. They need it quickly. And it takes a long time to build a power plant in the United States. So what we're seeing now is a power plant being built so-called behind the meter or privately. So what it means is it can be done a lot faster than a normal power plant, which can take years to permit. So I think that's raising concerns by people because they're concerned about what is the air pollution, they're concerned around any of the risks. But because there's a kind of fast-tracked permitting process, the public is caught out of a lot of the stages of this and they don't know what's happening. What's Meta saying about these concerns and your reporting? So we reached out to Meta and Meta, you know, they were aware of the story we were reporting. They were aware that we were kind of in the area in Middleton Township looking at the emerging Bowling Green data center and the power plant that's being built, Project Apollo. You know, they said that they are kind of abiding by state laws and that they're contributing to the community, that they've given grants to schools. They're doing workforce trainings with Bowling Green State University. So they have a whole list of things where they're kind of trying to show they're helping the community and kind of sharing the, you know, sharing the wealth with the community. I was specifically asking about the power plant because, you know, the power plant is being built quite quickly and Meta was pointing out that they are following the state laws and the state kind of is enabling this kind of faster construction, but also that it does plan to or that it is matching or adding on renewable energy in other parts of the country. And separately, I understand that Meta is going to voluntarily track its methane emissions associated with this data center. But also said that they don't prevent their project partners from addressing some of the questions that the public has during the process. However, in Ohio, the state legislature just recently, earlier this year, passed into law a measure that would basically impose criminal penalties on any local official that discloses information about such projects. Large infrastructure projects, which, you know, we understand to be data centers. And the worries and concerns don't stop with just Breanne Kidd and her family. There is an entire community, really communities, who would show up to any public meeting or hearing where their voices could be heard. There's a woman in particular that stood out named Christine Coltrip, who's a retired police officer. One of her biggest concerns is that essentially, if a data center was to move somewhere near her property, because she isn't a farmer with a lot of land, she doesn't think she'll get a fair price for her property. Different developers have approached some of her neighbors. So she's keeping track of all of the property owners around her. And once you have a couple of people willing to sell their property over for what can be very attractive sums of money, it puts the rest of the neighbors in a kind of bind. And so they have to either hope that the company will actually buy them out. Otherwise, the concern is that the real estate properties will drop. So she was very upset about the fact that local officials are signing nondisclosure agreements, that the names of companies are kind of hidden or they're obscured by a small LLC name. And she worries that this lack of transparency is really making it so that local officials can't be held accountable and that they don't need to answer questions from residents. If everybody just took a breath and kind of had a calm conversation, I think you'd find a lot more communities open to data centers. And you'd find data centers finding places where they're welcomed and not challenged. We spoke to Gary Thompson, who kind of oversees data centers for regional growth partners, which is an economic development agency for Northwest Ohio. Our goal for data centers in Northwest Ohio is to build wealth for our communities so that our schools are funded, our parks are funded, people that live in these communities have the kind of services that they need and desire, and also to build the brand of Northwest Ohio to be associated with big tech companies that are global presence so that we can attract other types of investment to Northwest Ohio as well. Broad sales pitch to the region, to the communities, are this kind of once-in-a-generation investment will enable rural America to stay rural because at the end of the day, it's a relatively small proportion of land that is being converted to data centers. And that the influx of investment and then the knock-on effects of having other companies invest will keep the region prosperous. And he was also saying, you know, there has been a brain drain of young people leaving and, you know, this is potentially an attractive way to draw young people or keep young people in the communities. I think people are skeptical about the long-term effects, but the construction jobs will be there for a long time. You know, these can be anywhere from six to 10 years. This push and pull over where and how to build the physical infrastructure of the AI revolution, it's not just unique to Northwest Ohio. I mean, it's not even unique to the United States. But according to a recent Reuters-Ipsos poll, just one in three Americans approve of the pace at which data centers are being built. Fifty-seven percent say they would actually oppose one of these things being built in their community, while 14 percent say they'd be OK with a data center being built near them. More than three-quarters of respondents say they're worried about AI making their electricity bill go up. So this is not just a story about Northwest Ohio. This is a story that's happening around the country in different kinds of communities around the country. So, you know, we saw in Northwest Ohio, this data center is really kind of riling up residents who kind of live in this rural, largely white part of the country. But, you know, we've also done some reporting recently on XAI, where their very rapid build out of their Colossus data center complex around the Memphis area, kind of touching into Mississippi, is disproportionately harming the black communities that surround the facility. So it's happening in different parts of the country. It's affecting different demographics. And this weekend, I think we're going to see what will be the first nationwide protest against this data center build out. This particular protest is being organized by a group that was founded by a former Tea Party member. So coming out of a conservative kind of point of view. And next month in August, a similar kind of nationwide week of protests is expected to happen. And that's being organized from the more progressive side of the political spectrum. However, I think both of these organizers are saying this is really not a left right issue. So many of the frustrations that people share are the same. So how are these companies addressing the concerns that are being raised by folks? So XAI didn't respond, but Elon Musk himself last year boasted about how quickly this build out has been able to happen, including the use of these turbines. And so this is something that Musk and that the company have been proud of. This is something that they are trying to set an example to the rest of, to other companies of here is a model of how we can rapidly build out all the infrastructure we need for artificial intelligence. So if the rapid expansion of these data centers is so controversial and yet so critical to the growth of AI and this technological revolution that we're experiencing, is there a way to do this in a way that's acceptable? Is there a model or a strategy that could work? Well, that is the million dollar question right now. And I think as we look ahead to the midterm elections, it's interesting to see how some candidates are now really having to face these questions. And so something that I've been seeing in recent reporting is, you know, the use of the word guardrails, like what are the guardrails that we can put in place to make sure that the companies don't saddle communities with very high electricity bills? How do we give them assurances that we won't deplete their water? So there is this push for responsible data center development coming again from across the spectrum. So even the White House has been very aware of this. They have earlier gotten some of the tech companies on board for a voluntary pledge to keep ratepayer bills down. They've seen the public polling. It's very skeptical, not only of the build out of the data centers, but of the use of the technology itself in the future. So the next couple of months will be very interesting to see how different politicians, especially in states where there's a lot of money coming in from these projects, really trying to balance that public anger, public fear with the economic opportunity and, you know, and in some cases with the national security imperative. So that being said, I need to note that sometimes we need to remind ourselves that there are data centers that have been in operation for decades. I mean, one example is Northern Virginia, so-called data center alley, very close to where I live. They've been operating for a while and without necessarily raising too much national attention. Perhaps there's been some local opposition to it. But this exponential growth, I think now we're beginning to see more backlash in Northern Virginia and what's happening across the country with this really rapid development. I think that's what's changed. It's been here, it's brought wealth to Northern Virginia, but I think it's also raised a lot of questions about resources and pollution. So we're in a very interesting moment where we'll see what the future will look like. Yeah, it's fascinating. This topic touches upon so many things that evoke big feelings. You know, I'm thinking about, you know, the use of technology that is in all of our homes and in our pockets, but also the ideas of autonomy and who has control over their communities. Eric, as a video journalist, you get to talk to a lot of everyday Americans through the course of your job. What are you hearing from folks that maybe touches upon some of the themes that we're seeing in this story? So many people that I have spoken to, whether it's relating to this story in Northwest Ohio or other David versus Goliath battles, as you could say, people feel like they're powerless against big giant companies, you know, Fortune 500 companies that seemingly can go straight to the politicians, the elected officials, get deals done, and then kind of leave everybody else on the wayside. Again, the community thinks that some of these meetings, some of these town halls they have are just pomp and circumstance, whereas things have already been laid, the groundwork's already been laid prior to those officials and those people ever putting themselves in front of the community. And so I've encountered that in a number of ways where people have just kind of felt at odds about politics in general and feeling like no matter which side they vote for, which party, which person, which candidate, it's going to be hard for them to find anybody who actually represents their real values. You know, I can't even imagine a year from now what the story is going to be. Things have happened so rapidly that, you know, even a year ago this time, the story is just evolving in such a frenetic pace. So it's exciting to be able to cover this. It's important to go out and to see it with your own eyes and to speak to people because I know that there's a lot of pushback from proponents of AI and data centers saying, oh, well, you know, people are being, you know, this is, you know, China or like online bots are fueling the discontent. I think the anger out there is real and you can see it. And, you know, these are not foreign agents. These are real people with real lives. And yeah, it's important to tell their story. A big thank you to Valerie and Eric for all their time and great reporting. Music and sound design for this episode was by Alex Summer. Our podcast team includes Eliza Davis-Beard, Mindy Burrows, Sharon Reich-Garson, Gail Issa, Abisoya Osundairo, Aethan Plotkin, Josh Sommer, Sebastian Sommer, Jonathan Steyers, Kim Vanell, and myself, Christopher Waljasper. Our senior producers are Tara Oaks, Carmel Crimmins, and Jonah Green. Our executive producer is Lila Dekretser. For daily news around the world, check out our sister podcast, Reuters World News, seven days a week. We'll be back next week on Assignment.