OpenAI said yesterday that it needs more computing power, and it is going to get what it wants—regardless of how anyone else feels about it. The Detroit Free Press reported that the Michigan Public Service Commission has given the green light to energy company DTE Energy to provide 1.4 gigawatts of power to a data center that will be a part of one of OpenAI’s planned Stargate projects.
The approval—which means the data center set to be built in Saline Township, about 40 miles southwest of Detroit, will go forward—was granted by the commission on an “ex parte” motion. That means that there will be no public hearing for the project, where groups and citizens could express their concerns and opposition to the project.
It certainly wasn’t granted because Michiganders are without concerns. The project was initially blocked by the Saline Township board, which denied a request to rezone farmland for the data center, but the developers sued and got the land in the settlement. Once they forced their way into the town of 2,328 people, they announced plans to build three separate 550,000 square feet facilities, meant to be a part of an OpenAI Stargate data center cluster that will supposedly eventually produce 5GW of computing capacity.
Residents feel railroaded by the whole thing. They’ve held protests in response to the township board’s decision to let the project move forward, and one resident filed a lawsuit to intervene, accusing the township government of violating the Open Meetings Act by choosing to settle the lawsuit in closed session without public input. That feeling surely hasn’t been assuaged by the township’s decision to issue an ex parte motion on the project.
Saline Township is just one of several communities across the country that are getting data centers thrust upon their citizens. According to a Wall Street Journal report from earlier this year, there are a handful of counties that have become data center hot spots, usually with small towns getting targeted by developers to host the hyperscalers. And while it’s unquestionably a dereliction of duty by local politicians to rubber-stamp these projects at the expense of their citizens, it’s easy to understand the temptation. The Saline Township project, for example, promises to pour $7 billion into the community. Other communities in similar situations have seen their local high schools transformed, homes get built, and businesses boom—at least, for a little.
While the construction of data centers has led to big upticks in economic activity in places that have been stagnant, it goes away as quickly as it arrives. They create very few long-term employment opportunities, so when the construction stops, so does a significant chunk of that flow of cash. That’s before considering the environmental risks that the projects pose, especially as they are rushed to move forward before the AI bubble pops and the money dries up.
Ideally, local governments would have a long enough view to consider these things. Instead, it seems residents like those in Saline Township are the ones who have to consider the ramifications. One person in Michigan told The Guardian that he believes the whole project is “uniquely evil” because of the township board and developer doing their dealings behind closed doors. Kathryn Haushalter, the Saline Township resident suing the board, made a pretty straightforward point at a recent rally against the data center project: “If an idea’s so great, AI is so great, so beneficial to our community, you don’t have to sue your way in.”
Saline Township’s fight is not unique. According to data from the organization Data Center Watch, at least 20 similar projects have been blocked by communities across the country in the last three months as they push back against their uninvited new neighbors. While these citizens may not always have allies in their local governments, they’ve got at least one at the federal level. Senator Bernie Sanders recently called for a nationwide pause on data center construction, arguing that companies are intentionally trying to push these projects through before lawmakers and citizens can catch up.
Of course, there’s a reason AI companies are trying to move so fast on these projects. Right now, investor money is flowing. These companies argue, as OpenAI recently did, that they need more compute to improve their models and eventually make tools that will generate revenue to justify all that investment. They, of course, don’t actually know if these better models will start raking in revenue or significantly improve, but their only chance to even find out is by spending someone else’s money. With doubt starting to build, even on Wall Street, that AI can be an infinite money glitch, the companies are running out of time to get those data centers up before the jig is up.
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