Overview
- Attorney General Kris Mayes on Monday asked Governor Katie Hobbs and lawmakers to pass a law halting approvals of new data centers, with special focus on large hyperscale AI projects.
- Mayes cited studies showing heavy resource strains, including a 2025 Ceres analysis that projects more than a 450% rise in data-center water demand in greater Phoenix if all planned projects proceed and an ASU study that found local temperatures can rise up to 4°F near data centers.
- Local opposition is already blocking projects: the Pinal County Board of Supervisors last week denied rezoning for a large data center, and neighbors near a planned Menlo Digital 1-million-square-foot campus in Ahwatukee remain mobilized.
- Mayes warns utilities’ crowded interconnection queues and proposed residential rate increases driven by new data-center power needs could shift infrastructure costs onto consumers, and she plans an Ahwatukee town hall on Oct. 14 to gather community input.
- The call for a pause faces political hurdles in a divided state government after past Republican efforts to limit local control and allow co-located small modular reactors were vetoed by Gov. Hobbs, and the debate is part of a wider national reassessment of big data-center approvals.