New joint study reveals a rapidly growing, bipartisan backlash against Big Tech’s physical infrastructure, with a new local opposition group forming every day
United States, 28th Apr 2026 — Today, the Coalition for Responsible Data Center Development, Evitable, and Together Against AI released the Data Center Opposition Report, which documents an unprecedented surge in grassroots opposition to hyperscale AI data centers across the United States. The report identifies 268 local data center opposition groups organizing through Facebook.
According to the report, more than 360,000 Americans have mobilized to resist the construction of hyperscale data center facilities across 37 states. Total opposition membership has quadrupled since December 2025, with more than one new group forming per day. The opposition is spread between blue and red states, as well as over 100,000 people in swing states.
The largest planned AI data centers will have an electrical capacity of over 1 gigawatt (1,000 megawatts), which is as much as the entire city of Seattle. This enormous scale and energy consumption is one of the main reasons for the surge in opposition. “Many people are concerned about the effects of million-square-foot data centers that would use as much electricity as entire cities,” said Matthew Shaw, one of the authors. “The construction of power-hungry hyperscale data centers is raising alarms among locals about everything from power bills and water use to noise and pollution,” he added.
On top of this, non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) are a common practice in the process of land acquisition and rezoning for data centers. “Many people are understandably frustrated,” Matthew Shaw says, “because deals are being made behind NDAs to put giant data centers next to residential neighborhoods, and subsidize them with 90% tax cuts.”
“The massive data centers AI companies want to build are proving incredibly unpopular with local communities. They have to fight to get their concerns addressed; plans for datacenters are getting rushed through without citizens’ consent,” said David Krueger, CEO of Evitable. “We’re keen to show people the scope of this resistance and how they can help support people involved in these fights.”
“Initially, we just wanted to make a list of opposition groups so people could find one near them,” said Matthew Shaw, one of the report’s authors. “But when we updated the membership counts in February, we were shocked at how quickly the movement had grown, so we decided to track the numbers on a monthly basis.”
Opposition groups across America are collectively fundraising approximately $1.4 million, with a median ask of just $8,000 per campaign. The publicly available donation links are listed in the report’s appendix.
To read the report, visit datacenteropposition.com. The data will be updated monthly.
Media Contact
Organization: Coalition for Responsible Data Center Development
Contact Person: Matthew Shaw
Website: https://datacenteropposition.com
Email: Send Email
Country:United States
Release id:44420
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