We Found the Hidden Cost of Data Centers. It's in Your Electric Bill [video]

I accept that data centers generate more load for a system. Which will make the overall system need more maintenance, which is something that others paying into the system will also have to support. But, I'm not clear on why this is a hidden cost.

Consider, if people get the new housing developments that they want, that would also add load to the system. This larger energy system will be more expensive to run, which will lead to higher costs. Adding houses would probably be even more expensive in the transmission maintenance costs associated.

Any model you do that tries to prevent this is essentially rent stabilization for early members. And that has a pretty good track record of not being a good idea.

Data Centers do not work like this. They don't generate any new sales taxes, they don't really generate much in the way of new jobs, and they often don't even pay property taxes at all (our biggest data center here, for example, got a sweetheart deal on a massive property tax exemption -- they literally don't have to pay any property tax at all)

Data Centers also don't pay standard price for their power -- they get 'industrial' power rates (locally here, our industrial power rate is much lower than what a home would pay for equivalent kwh usage, even after factoring in transmission differences).

If you just charged equivalent access (if industrial users had to pay to-the-penny exactly the same prices as a residential user, identical transmission fees, identical per-kwh prices, identical time-of-day usage surcharges, etc), it would go a long way to making the data center setup more fair for everyone.