Everyone can find a reason to dislike data center construction

AI companies keep talking like more computing is the obvious next step, and their spending plans reflect that confidence. But the people who have to live near the hardware are pushing back hard. More than 60% of Americans now favor limiting new data centers, especially in their own communities, and the opposition has become strong enough to disrupt $68 billion in projects in just the second quarter of 2026, according to Data Center Watch.

A new Data & Society report tries to explain why the backlash is growing instead of fading. The nonprofit spent 18 months doing ethnographic fieldwork in Pennsylvania, interviewing 44 people between 2024 and 2026. The researchers are not trying to prove how much data centers change the world in measurable terms. They are trying to understand how ordinary residents experience the fight over them, and why the industry’s “AI is inevitable” pitch keeps landing so badly.

Pennsylvania is a particularly interesting case because the state was originally sold on data centers as economic development. Governor Josh Shapiro headlined a July 2025 summit celebrating $90 billion in data center and AI infrastructure investment. A year later, he signed an order that added new requirements for data center projects and pulled them out of a regulatory fast-track process. That is a tidy way to signal that the political weather changed.

The report’s authors argue that the pushback is less a single movement than a messy coalition. Some people simply hate new development. Some dislike AI and the corporate power behind it. Environmental groups worry about water use and emissions. Others are focused on more immediate, material concerns: power bills, property values, and the local officials who seem to turn mysterious once a developer shows up with a plan and an NDA.

Trade unions are one of the few groups still openly in favor, mainly because they see construction jobs and a chance to rebuild their ranks. But even that support comes with a catch: the report says these facilities will not be major long-term employers once built. So the industry gets the politics of industrial boomtowns without the old bargain that made people tolerate them.