- Seattle City Council votes unanimously to ban new data center projects for an entire year
- Gives council time to consider impacts of AI data centers on local resources
- Residents are fed up with facing higher electricity bills with no clear benefits.
Seattle passed a one-year moratorium on building new data centers, and the city council voted unanimously in favor of the measure on June 9, 2026, making it the largest US city yet to introduce such measures.
The temporary measure targets new projects instead of previously approved construction, citing concerns about energy consumption, water use, noise and other environmental impacts, as well as rising utility bills faced by residents.
“Today’s approval of the moratorium does not stop AI or data centers,” Councilwoman Débora Juárez said in a city news release, noting that it instead serves to create time for Seattle to develop its own regulations around future projects.
Seattle bans new data center projects
Public opposition quickly accelerated after reports revealed that four companies were exploring up to five large-scale projects in and around the city, which together could have used 369 MW of energy, the equivalent of around a third of the entire city.
As a result, many residents came to council meetings to express concerns about increased electricity costs, e-waste generation, grid reliability, land use and its impacts on housing, and limited job creation relative to resource consumption.
“We’ve heard from tens of thousands of residents: Seattleites should not be subsidizing large corporations’ record profits due to the rise of AI,” said Council Member Eddie Lin.
The pause gives Seattle time to consider all of these concerns over the course of the next year without having to deal with the noise of approving additional projects.
Importantly, the moratorium is noteworthy given that Seattle is home to two of the world’s largest technology companies and the two hyperscalers that account for the largest cloud market shares: Amazon and Microsoft.
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