On Tuesday, the Democrat-controlled state legislature in Maine handed a ban on massive knowledge facilities. It wasn’t precisely shut. The state’s Home handed it 79-62, and the Senate handed it 21-13—alongside get together strains with a couple of exceptions, in line with the Wall Road Journal. Governor Janet Mills’ signature continues to be wanted earlier than it turns into regulation, and the Journal says she has signaled curiosity in signing such a ban underneath sure circumstances.
This ban handed despite—or maybe due to—comparatively low knowledge middle exercise in Maine. Enterprise Insider maps probably knowledge facilities building by monitoring allow requests for sure mills, and Maine seems to solely have two such initiatives. Nevertheless, knowledge middle demand drives up house vitality prices, and the web site Electrical Alternative ranks Maine fourth highest in electrical energy costs.
Insider additionally notes that comparable legislative efforts have stalled or failed outright in Georgia, Maryland, Michigan, New Hampshire, New York, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Vermont, Virginia, and Wisconsin. Loads of different cities and states are nonetheless contemplating legal guidelines like this one.
Maine’s ban has often been described as a ban on “massive” knowledge facilities, however the threshold is 20 megawatts, which is definitely fairly low, and successfully blocks building of what’s generally referred to as an AI knowledge middle. In response to the Regional Plan Affiliation, whereas knowledge facilities used about two megawatts of electrical energy when the idea of a knowledge middle was new, the typical modern knowledge middle makes use of about 40 megawatts.
Maine’s invoice locations a moratorium on building till November of 2027, and likewise creates a council whose job might be to judge the price of knowledge facilities on the folks of Maine.
