Trump’s EPA Chief Will Not Protect Communities and Environment from Data Center Pollution
Despite the unpopularity of data centers, EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin will not use his enforcement authorities to set rules to protect public
WASHINGTON — At an event hosted by Politico, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin today told an audience he would not push for nationwide environmental requirements or recommendations to protect communities from data center development.
Saying that data centers were being painted with a broad brush, Zeldin told an audience: “I’m not going to sit inside of an agency building in Washington, D.C. and say that we know that local community in Georgia or Florida or Arizona or elsewhere, better than everyone there locally.”
In response, Clara Vondrich, senior policy counsel with Public Citizen’s Climate Program said:
“Zeldin just gave Big Tech the green light to build data centers that will consume massive amounts of power and water without any enforcement by the EPA. He says he won’t meddle in community affairs, but his inaction dooms communities to higher asthma rates, noise and light pollution, and new fossil fuel infrastructure the climate can’t afford.
“Once again, the Administration is dangerously out of touch with the needs and wants of the American people: A majority of registered voters oppose building data centers in their local area, and six in ten think that if a data center opened in their local area, their electricity bills would increase.
“Yet the Administration insists on enabling Big Tech companies in the race to be first and fastest, cosigning their reckless buildout of behemoth AI data centers with a combination of gas, diesel, and even coal. Zeldin is right that we should follow what communities want. And that’s clear: no dirty data centers near their homes, schools, parks, and playgrounds.
“Big Tech executives have lobbied hard to ingratiate themselves into the Trump administration’s orbit. Today Zeldin made clear that their investment was money well spent.”
# # #