Americans living in rural areas are increasingly souring on data centers.
In a new poll by the Pew Research Center, which surveyed people in August, half of rural Americans said data centers “are mostly bad for the environment” — a figure substantially higher than in January, when it sat at 32%.
46% of those respondents also said that data centers would drive up home energy costs, up from 32% in January. 45% said they negatively impact the quality of life for those living nearby, while 28% said so in January.
While displeasure with data centers increased among Americans across the board, according to Pew, higher levels of antagonism among rural voters are striking because most data centers are built in rural areas.
The data center buildout, which proponents say is integral for the US to keep pace with China in the AI race, has been suffering a PR crisis as a bipartisan coalition of lawmakers moves to impose limits on data center construction.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbot, who was formerly bullish about building data centers in his state, recently backed away from that optimism. His administration has halted some 1,800 AI data center projects in the state.
All across the country, Americans are rallying to fight against AI data centers, which can cost billions to build and span hundreds of acres. Many are concerned about how the sprawling facilities will affect the environment, utility prices, water resources, and noise levels. Some just don’t like AI.
For AI companies like OpenAI, Anthropic, Meta, Google, and others, the issue is existential. Without AI data centers, they can’t power the products they sell. Sam Altman has recently suggested that new data centers could be built far from where people lived, such as the desert.
Proponents of data centers have said the buildout brings jobs to rural areas. Venture capitalist Gavin Baker recently said that data centers are “probably the best thing that has ever happened to working-class Americans.”
Tech bros haven’t been able to agree on exactly why Americans aren’t taking to the data center buildout. Some have postulated that a Chinese-orchestrated psy-op is behind the distrust, while others said tech leaders haven’t sold the product well.
President Donald Trump, for his part, called the data center buildout “the golden goose,” and warned against falling behind China.
“The only reason that communities throughout the U.S.A. should not want Data Centers is if they want to end up being backwards and poor,” Trump said in August in a Truth Social post.
In the Pew poll, very few Americans — about 4% — said data centers are “good” for the environment, energy costs, and quality of life.
“Americans have grown more negative toward the possible environmental and economic effects of data centers since the beginning of the year,” Pew said in a release. “And a majority say they’d be uncomfortable if a new data center started operating in their area.”
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