Sponsors (6)
The bill increases transparency on data centers' water, energy, emissions, and community impacts—helping planning, enforcement, and environmental justice—while creating reporting burdens, potential cost pass-through to customers, and proprietary/security risks if data are not carefully managed.
State and local governments, plus utilities, gain regular, detailed data on data centers' water and energy use so they can plan allocations, bolster grid resilience, and prevent local shortages or outages.
Policymakers and regulators receive frequent emissions and pollutant reporting from data centers, improving the ability to target mitigation, enforcement, and public-health protections.
Overburdened communities (e.g., low-income neighborhoods and racial/ethnic minority communities) will be identified through cumulative-impact documentation, enabling targeted environmental-justice interventions.
Households and businesses could face higher prices or reduced services if data centers pass compliance and reporting costs on to customers.
Taxpayers and federal agencies may bear increased compliance and administrative costs from frequent reporting requirements.
Public release of detailed data about individual data centers could create proprietary or security risks for operators if information is not adequately anonymized or protected.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Directs EPA and EIA to publish recurring public reports on data centers' water use, pollutant discharges, greenhouse gas emissions, and energy consumption and local impacts.
Introduced January 8, 2026 by Robert Menendez · Last progress January 8, 2026
Requires two federal agencies to collect and publish regular public reports on the environmental and energy impacts of U.S. data centers. The Environmental Protection Agency must report quarterly on water use, water reuse, pollutant discharges, effects on local water systems, and greenhouse gas emissions; the Energy Information Administration must collect semiannual energy-use data for each data center and publish semiannual, state-disaggregated reports on energy consumption, new data centers, and household energy impacts.