(Madison) – To help address public concern across the state, Assembly Republicans passed regulations on data centers to help protect Wisconsin residents and communities. Rep. Krug joined his Republican colleagues in approving this important legislation today.
“With the increased interest and construction of data centers across Wisconsin and the nation, I was proud to support legislation protecting our residents and communities,” said Rep. Krug. “As with any new technological development it is important that it doesn’t create more problems and hardships than it solves. What we passed today helps ensure these data centers don’t pass along increased costs for residents, limits their water usage, and addresses land-use concerns.”
AB 840 passed by a vote of 53-44. The legislation puts the following protections in place:
- Prevents data center operators from passing their energy costs onto residential consumers
- Data centers must pay their own way to protect ratepayers from subsidizing large-scale private energy demands
- Requires data centers to use closed-loop cooling systems, which recycles a fixed volume of water and addresses large-scale water usage concerns
- Land reclamation and use costs are borne by the data center and not the community
“Wisconsin residents should not pay higher energy rates, give up their land, or see their water depleted because of data center construction and operation,” said Rep. Krug. “The bill we passed today in the Assembly makes sure that they won’t.”
