When AI hands us lemons, states should make clean-energy lemonade
In 2026, Americans have been handed two lemons: a warming climate and an artificial intelligence data-center boom straining the nation's electricity and water systems. Maybe it's time to squeeze them together and make lemonade.
First lemon: Temperatures are rising around the world. Western Europe suffered a record heat wave this summer. Spain, for example, recorded 61 heat wave days, with Barcelona hitting 105 F, the hottest temperature since measurements began over a century ago. Researchers suspect rapid glacial melting and unusually warm conditions contributed to a catastrophic flood in Nepal.
Record heat is hitting the U.S. as well. In August, the Los Angeles suburb of Woodland Hills reached a record 111 F, while downtown LA itself tied its record of 98 F.
Scientists attribute global warming primarily to greenhouse gases, especially carbon dioxide released by burning fossil fuels like coal, oil and natural gas. And what is the Trump administration doing about all this? Fanning the flames. It has repealed most Biden-era carbon limits on coal- and gas-fired power plants, opened 13.1 million acres of federal land to future coal mining, halted new offshore-wind leasing, and used emergency authority to keep coal-fired generating plants open.
Second lemon: The AI gold rush requires staggering amounts of electricity to operate and grow. At the end of 2025, the U.S. had 580 operational hyperscale data centers, with another 437 in the development pipeline, run by companies like Amazon, Microsoft, Google, Meta and Oracle. A single new gigawatt-scale AI center can consume as much electricity as a sizable city.
Unwilling to wait for more generation capacity, Elon Musk's xAI has been using 69 temporary mobile natural gas turbines at its site in Mississippi to power its data centers. The mobile turbines are relatively inefficient and can emit 40% to 60% more CO2 per megawatt-hour than modern natural gas plants.
All this new demand is arriving as electricity prices are rising. Residential electricity prices nationally were 5% higher in June than they were a year earlier, with increases of more than 10% in some states, including Michigan and Pennsylvania.
On top of that, data centers can affect clean-water availability and cost, especially in arid regions and in communities where drinking water is used for cooling. Even three years ago, the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory estimated that generating the electricity used by U.S. data centers consumed roughly 211 billion gallons. Although a newer national water estimate is not yet available from the lab, data-center electricity consumption has continued to climb.
New York has imposed a one-year moratorium on new hyperscale data centers. Legislators in 15 other states are considering similar moves. Unwilling to wait, local governments in states including Michigan, Georgia, North Carolina, Indiana, Missouri and Illinois have imposed their own stoppages.
Lemonade: U.S. companies are racing to build these centers as they innovate and compete for leadership in AI. The projects bring investment and construction jobs, but they also impose substantial new demands on electricity and, in many cases, water.
Why then not require these hyperscale data centers to cover their added electricity demand with low- or zero-carbon generation, such as wind or solar? An AP-NORC/Energy Policy Institute poll conducted in July found 65% of Americans are in favor of requiring data centers to use clean energy.
Washington has imposed no such energy or water requirements. But states don't have to wait. They can take action now.
States could also require data centers to reuse cooling water. For example, Microsoft and the city of Quincy, Washington, built a recycling system that treats and recirculates data-center cooling water, reducing reliance on potable groundwater by an estimated 138 million gallons a year or 97%.
It looks like it's up to the states to take action. Back in 1932, Supreme Court Justice Louis D. Brandeis wrote, "It is one of the happy incidents of the federal system that a single courageous State may, if its citizens choose, serve as a laboratory; and try novel social and economic experiments without risk to the rest of the country."
Come on, states. It's still warm out. Let's make some lemonade.
© 2026, Creators