What the research says

Who pays for the power

• Georgia Power and the Public Service Commission (WABE, Aug 27, 2026). ↗ For the planned OpenAI data center in Effingham County (3,200 megawatts), Georgia Power agreed that if a data center closes or leaves the state, the cost of serving it goes to other data centers and large customers, not to homes and small businesses. It also raised its promised offset to about $15 a month for a customer using 1,000 kWh, starting with the 2029 rate case. That promise is an offset to increases, not a promise rates will fall. The public version of the OpenAI contract is entirely redacted. A Southern Environmental Law Center attorney called the deal a step in the right direction and said the costs still need to be tracked.
• The mid-Atlantic grid (CNBC, Nov 2025). ↗ From August 2024 to August 2025, home electric bills rose 6% across the country, 13% in Virginia, 16% in Illinois and 12% in Ohio. The grid's own market watchdog found data centers made up $9.3 billion, or 63%, of the 2025 to 2026 bill for reserving power plants. Caution: CNBC also reports other causes, such as old lines and slow approvals, and prices rose only about 4% in Texas, which has more than 400 data centers. The effect depends on the local grid.
• Carnegie Mellon University (a model). ↗ It estimates data center and crypto growth could raise average U.S. power generation costs about 8% by 2030, and more than 25% in parts of Virginia. Caution: this is a computer model of what might happen, not a measurement.
• Union of Concerned Scientists (an advocacy group, Sept 2025). ↗ Found $4.3 billion in 2024 of costs to connect data centers to the grid in seven states, spread across all customers under old rules. A Harvard Electricity Law Initiative paper ↗ (March 2025) reviewed nearly 50 rate cases and reached a similar worry about secret contracts.
• Greenlink Analytics and Science for Georgia (Dec 2025). ↗ Their model says utilities in Georgia, Alabama and the Carolinas are planning for data center growth that has roughly a 1-in-500 chance of happening, because most credible forecasts show less. Caution: an advocacy group helped write it, for the Southern Environmental Law Center.

Noise

• Science for Georgia and Quiet Communities survey (spring 2026). ↗ 103 people who live near data centers and crypto mines answered. 83% could hear it inside their home. Among people living more than half a mile away, 76% still could. Among those who could hear it inside, 71% said it hurt their rest and 65% their sleep. Caution: small, self-selected group; not yet peer reviewed.
• Why two kinds of readings matter. ↗ The usual meter setting (dBA) is built to match what ears notice, so it under-counts the deep hum from fans and power equipment. The World Health Organization has written that when low tones dominate, dBA-based measures are "inappropriate." That is why the sample ordinance asks for a second reading (dBC). See our Noise page.
• Lawsuits. ↗ The New York Times reported in June 2026 that residents of three small cities had sued over data center noise in the previous month.

Water

• University of Georgia Extension (June 2026). ↗ A medium-size data center can use up to about 300,000 gallons a day, about 1,000 households. A large one can use up to 5 million. Closed-loop cooling can cut water use by up to about 70%, but it uses more electricity. Most data centers draw from drinking-water systems.
• If you have a well, UGA says to consider testing it now, to have a before-picture. A test would not prove who caused a later change. Your county Extension office can help.
• Virginia (Virginia Mercury, a commentary, June 2026). ↗ Four counties have promised Amazon at least 19.6 million gallons a day, based on public records the writers requested.
• Cheyenne, Wyoming (Cowboy State Daily, July 2026). ↗ The city said a contractor for Meta's data center sent wastewater containing a bacterium into the city's system, which took months to clean up. The city stopped accepting wastewater from data center cooling systems. Meta said its contractor found no trace of the substance in its own testing.
• Georgia bill. Senate Bill 421 would stop local governments from hiding a data center's water and power use behind secret agreements. It was waiting in committee as of May 2026.

Air and backup generators

• Memphis (The Guardian, Jan 2026). ↗ The U.S. EPA ruled that gas turbines used to power Elon Musk's xAI data centers need air permits, even if "temporary." The company had run up to 35 of them without permits under a local loophole.
• Virginia (Washington Post, May 2026, as summarized by Science for Georgia). ↗ About 10,500 generators attached to Virginia data centers, run less than an hour a week on average, were estimated to cause as much harm to public health as five large gas power plants, and at least three early deaths a year. We could read only the start of the Post story, so this is Science for Georgia's summary of it.
• Texas (New York Times, Aug 2026). ↗ Regulators approved a gas plant for a Meta data center in El Paso in 20 days, and others in 3 days and 2 days, without public notice. We could read only the start of this story.

See our Generators page for what is known about backup power at Burkhalter Road.

Schools and neighborhoods

• The 74 (Aug 3, 2026). ↗ Researchers at Brown University counted 1,878 public schools within a mile of a data center or an approved future one. The same researchers say a paper coming soon will show lower math scores at schools closer to data centers. That paper has not been published, so we cannot judge it yet.
• Coweta County, Georgia. ↗ The county rezoned 832 acres for a data center campus called Project Sail, with the nearest building about 1,000 feet from an elementary school. Neighbors are suing and gathering signatures for a referendum, and were near their 14,000-signature goal when the story ran. The company says it will meet or exceed every requirement.
• Power lines (New York Times video, June 2026). ↗ Georgia Power's 10-year plan went from 24 miles of new transmission lines in 2019 to 1,065 miles. A homeowner in Fayetteville was offered $57,000 for half her back yard. Georgia Power says it uses eminent domain less than 1% of the time.

Jobs and tax breaks

• An opinion piece (Michigan Advance, Aug 2026). ↗ The writer estimated a typical 100-megawatt data center costs about $1 billion to build and another $2.5 to $4 billion for equipment, and spends about $5 to $10 million a year on all staff. He asked what the business plan is that pays for it. It is a commentary, not a study.
• Science for Georgia ↗ says data centers create about 30 permanent jobs after construction. On Burkhalter Road, the builder's own estimate is about 12. See our Costs page.
• Tax break dollar figures: see our Costs page, where we use the state auditor's 2025 numbers and the state's own projections, each with its source.

What we left out, and why

• Stories behind a paywall that we could read only the first few lines of. We list them above only where another source summarized them, and we say so.
• A 2022 article from a data center equipment company about energy use. It is a vendor's marketing blog and out of date.
• A consumer blog's claim that a data center can use as much water as 16,000 households. We could not trace it to a study, so we use the UGA figures instead.
• Pages that would not load, were not about this topic, or were only comments.

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