County with 37 Data Centers Asks Schools to 'Conserve Electricity'

This is in Virgina, which passed the Virginia Clean Economy Act in 2020. This mandated that Dominion (the power company) transition to 100% renewable energy by 2045. Personally, I think this is a good thing in the long run, but in the short run, it means that Dominion has had to invest a lot in building out renewable projects that haven't come online yet. Lawrence Berkeley National Lab recently did an analysis on electricity prices in the US [1] and found that most of the rate increase in Virginia was attributable to the VCEA, and that load growth had a mitigating effect on price increases. If you look at the overall report (not just Virginia), the places where electricty costs are rising the fastest are generally not the same places where lots of new datacenters are being built. It's easy to blame datacenters, but there are many factors at play here. [1] https://emp.lbl.gov/publications/factors-influencing-recent-...

If everyone turned off their lights 100% of the time they left their workstation, they could power those additional data centers for about one second.

I think the issues are exacerbated by the US going from "regular growth in electricity generation" for decades to "dead flat" for the last ~2 decades. I think we're finding generation isn't just a switch you turn on and reap the benefits of overnight if it's not what you were already planning on doing https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/e... Part of solving that may be in what the article touches on - how to get the generation built before the DC shows up rather than as a promise after.

You want to use a lot of electricity? Great! We sell electricity. We will need cash in advance to handle some upgrades, rather than passing those costs on to other rate payers.

The greed with which the tech companies and data center providers are consuming electricity will be their downfall. By trying to make a few extra bucks by passing on some of the costs to consumers, it will trigger a huge political backlash that will screw them all. The fact they don't realize this is greed and hubris on their part.