Abbott announces QTS Data Centers will meet Texas standards
AUSTIN – Governor Greg Abbott today announced that QTS Data Centers has committed to comply with the standards and guidelines he established and participate in the State’s comprehensive audit.
“Let’s be clear: the growth of data centers must not come before the quality of life of Texans,” said Governor Abbott. “I established clear guardrails to ensure data centers protect our electric grid, conserve our water, respect our neighborhoods, and pay their own way.
They must not pass costs on to Texas families or interfere with their quality of life. QTS is setting an example of responsible data center development by embracing my standards, and any company that wants to do business in Texas should expect to do the same.”
Earlier this summer, Governor Abbott established clear, commonsense statewide standards to ensure data center development does not come at the expense of Texas families or communities. The Governor directed the Public Utilities Commission of Texas (PUCT) and the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) to ensure data centers:
• Pay for their electric infrastructure instead of shifting costs onto Texas families and small businesses.
• Reuse their own water.
• Reduce the cost of electricity for Texans.
• Do not disrupt residential neighborhoods to preserve Texas’ quality of life.
• Pay their own way and eliminate reliance on outdated taxpayer-funded incentives.
Building on those standards, Governor Abbott also directed the PUCT and ERCOT to pause all pending data center interconnection requests until each project undergoes and successfully completes ERCOT's comprehensive audit.
In addition, the PUCT and ERCOT will examine each data center project and how they will:
• Pay their own way by disclosing all taxpayer-funded incentives, grants, abatements, and other public financial assistance tied to the project.
• Provide their own power by detailing projected electricity demand and plans for on-site generation or other measures to reduce reliance on the ERCOT grid.
• Protect Texas water resources by identifying water sources, projected water use, water reuse procedures, and water-efficient cooling technologies.
• Outline measures to reduce impacts on neighboring property owners and communities, including noise mitigation, light controls, setbacks, traffic improvements, emergency response coordination, and other community protect measures.
• Provide full transparency by disclosing project ownership and controlling interests.
• Any data center company that fails to comply with ERCOT’s audit process will be denied the ability to interconnect to the Texas grid.
Since Governor Abbott issued these commonsense directives, the following companies have responded:
• Diode announced that it failed to meet the Governor’s standards and will not pursue a proposed data center in Henderson County.
• Amazon sent a letter stating they are committed to working with the State of Texas and embracing the Governor's standards.
• Google welcomed Texas’ standards and committed to working with state leaders to ensure data centers increase affordability, protect resources, and create new jobs.
• Chevron announced plans to build a Texas power plan for a Microsoft data center that will mitigate impacts to water resources and the grid. This makes it compliant with the Governor’s standards.
