Sponsors (7)
The bill aims to reduce environmental, grid, community, and national-security risks from data center siting through federal guidance and best practices, but doing so may shift where investment flows, add planning costs and delays, and influence local control.
Electricity consumers, utilities, and taxpayers: DOE siting guidance that accounts for grid capacity, transmission needs, and connection timelines reduces the risk of higher electricity prices and reliability disruptions from new data centers.
Local and regional communities: required consideration of site characteristics and environmental impacts reduces air and water pollution and greenhouse gas emissions associated with data center development.
National security stakeholders: guidance that considers geographic concentration and requires consultation with DoD and FERC lowers risks from clustering critical data infrastructure in vulnerable locations.
Communities not designated as 'ideal locations' (and their local governments): the list could concentrate investment and jobs in certain areas, leaving other communities with reduced development, economic opportunity, and local tax revenue.
Developers, small businesses, and local governments: complying with new federal siting guidance and periodic revisions may impose additional planning costs and cause permitting delays.
Local governments: even if nonbinding, federal guidance may influence permitting and incentives in practice and could constrain local planning flexibility.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Directs DOE, with other agencies, to publish and periodically update best-practice guidance for siting data centers that minimize grid, water, environmental, community, and national security impacts.
Requires the Department of Energy, working with FERC, DOD, and other relevant agencies, to create, publish, and periodically update best-practice guidance for siting data centers. The guidance must address effects on the electric grid, water use and availability, environmental impacts, community impacts (noise, light, appearance), national security risks from concentration of centers, workforce effects, and local economic and tax impacts, and must include lists of site characteristics that minimize harms and lists of ideal locations. The Secretary must post initial best practices online within one year, review and revise them within two years after initial publication, and then at least every two years thereafter. The bill defines “data center” by reference to an existing federal definition in EISA 2007.
Official title: To direct the Secretary of Energy to establish best practices for the siting of data centers.
Introduced September 8, 2026 by Suhas Subramanyam · Last progress September 8, 2026