By Eric Hausker • Conservation Chair, Loantaka Group
We have seen technical innovations arise, develop, and transform our society before. The discovery and mass generation of electricity, the invention of internal combustion engines, and the deployment of atomic energy—all of these have been double-edged swords which have benefitted and “wrecked” our global society. Electrification and fossil fuel-driven forms of transportation and industry have led to unstoppable climate change and sea level rise; nuclear plants can help but bring their own set of harsh difficulties.
Now, artificial intelligence (AI) looms as the next big transformer of our lives. Technical innovations that promise faster and faster access to and exchange of information are impossible to resist because of the powerful sectors of the economy that demand them. The data centers required by AI will be as hard to manage and control as fracking was. They present a nightmarish problem to our Chapter’s Environmental Committee.
The New Jersey Chapter of the Sierra Club has properly determined that data centers are a threat to the health of our environment because of what they do to the communities where they are being sited:
• Data centers accelerate the already increasing demand for electricity. They compete for energy with existing industrial, transportation, and residential users and make the transition from fossil fuel to clean renewable energy more difficult. Currently, data centers consume 12% of the US electricity supply.
• Data center energy demand raises prices for other users of electricity. One data center can use as much wattage as it takes to power 100,000 homes.
• When water is used to reduce the heat generated in the interior of a data center, such warmed water causes thermal pollution when discharged into lakes and rivers. Just one medium-sized data enter can use more than 300,000 gallons daily.
• The rows and rows of diesel generators, used when data centers cannot get enough energy from the grid, create air pollution in the form of fine particulate matter (just like diesel trucks), nitrous oxide, and CO2.
• Perhaps most unpleasant for homeowners near them, data centers produce background noise that may exceed 85 decibels. This humming penetrates the inside of homes and spoils the fun of being outdoors. Property values will inevitably suffer.
In New Jersey, over 100 data centers are either currently in operation or planned. These data warehouses in Essex, Hudson, and Union counties raise the issue of environmental justice, as they burden neighborhoods already suffering from more than their fair share of air pollution and noise.
There is hope, however. The worst aspects of the explosion of data centers (3,900 so far in the US) are provoking grassroots outrage. Fifty percent of Americans are in favor of bans on data centers. In New Jersey, pre-emptive bans on their construction are rapidly being enacted. To date, over 25 municipalities have done so. This resistance is bi-partisan—in Warren County, solid GOP territory, 11 towns have prohibited data centers from being built. New Providence and Berkeley Heights have recently joined the list.
Loantaka Group Chair Rich Isaacs joined me in mid-summer to lend Sierra Club support to a Kenilworth group called Union County Residents Alliance Coalition. We met Renee Spaziani, the grassroots leader, and 100 of us stood along Kenilworth Boulevard to protest against the data center already under construction there (approved last year) and the proposed addition of two more next to it, on the old property of Merck near Parkway Exit 138.
I learned from one participant that people who are looking to buy houses in the area around the data center are already asking about the noise level caused by the servers, the constant vehicle traffic, the backup generators, and the cooling equipment.
An anecdote I found online came from a neighboring state: Residents complaining about the noise from a new data center were told by the sneaky plant manager that the diesel generators had been turned on “just for testing”—and of course were never turned off.
When local town councils are persuaded to approve a data center, the sneakiness continues: The companies urge the councils to sign non-disclosure agreements so that information about actual power and water usage are not made public.
Despite the encouraging fact that $64 billion worth of planned installations and projects were cancelled between May 2024 and March 2025, AI companies and their high-powered lawyers will often get their way. In such cases, measures to limit the damage they cause can be taken.
The amusing acronym “BYONCE” (bring your own new clean energy) refers to stipulations that data centers generate their own power using solar and wind. Towns may also require the use of “closed loop water cooling systems” to prevent heated water from being discharged into the environment. The water will be cooled then re-used, all within the confines of the plant. As for the external noise, some kind of sound barrier like those lining highways may need to be considered.
Gov. Mikie Sherrill is trying to forestall the coming intense competition for electric power by giving a green light to nuclear plants. And on May 27, she issued a set of guidelines for data centers that in this author’s view don’t go far enough. Sherrill’s “Fair Share Rules” include the following:
• Data centers must use clean, renewable energy and contribute to infrastructure investment.
• Data center operators must be transparent and honest about projected energy and water usage.
• Operation standards will be set to enable local governments to seek redress regarding pollution and noise.
• During construction, local labor must be paid competitive wages.
We certainly have our work cut out for us.