Lancaster County Weighs Data Center Building Moratorium

A Nebraska County Joins a National Reckoning

Lancaster County, Nebraska, is weighing whether to pause new data center construction, a move that would place it among a growing roster of Nebraska counties reconsidering how — and whether — to accommodate the industry's rapid expansion 1. The debate mirrors a wave of local and state-level pushback playing out across the country, as communities grapple with the physical footprint, power demands, and water use tied to the facilities powering the artificial intelligence boom.

From Boomtowns to Backlash

Not long ago, data centers were welcomed almost uniformly as economic development wins. Loudoun County, Virginia — often called the heart of "Data Center Alley" — has not gone a single day in 16 years without a data center under construction, a testament to just how entrenched the industry has become in some regions, even as residents increasingly describe their landscape as dotted with "weird concrete buildings everywhere" 2. That kind of saturation is now the exception driving anxiety elsewhere, as other communities watch similar buildout patterns emerge in their own backyards and move preemptively to slow them down.

The scale of what's being proposed nationally helps explain the unease. In Piketon, Ohio, a project pitched as potentially the world's largest data center — built on a former uranium enrichment site — carries an estimated price tag near $500 billion and is drawing local support despite its size 3. In Georgia, a newly approved OpenAI-linked data center could become one of Georgia Power's single largest electricity customers, illustrating how individual projects can now rival entire industrial sectors in energy consumption 5.

Policy Responses Multiply

Governments are responding unevenly but increasingly assertively. Pennsylvania has become the latest state to restrict data-center construction, with Gov. Josh Shapiro requiring developers to present energy plans that don't push costs onto ordinary households, along with securing local community buy-in 4. That posture reflects a broader political shift: Republican and Democratic officials alike — including Texas Gov. Greg Abbott and Shapiro — are reportedly nervous that mishandling the data center boom could become a lasting political liability heading into 2028 7.

Public Opinion Sours, Land Values Rise

Survey data backs up the shifting mood. A University of Virginia study found more than three in five Americans now oppose data center construction near them, citing worries over strained water supplies and electricity grids 6. Yet even as opposition grows, the scramble for suitable sites is intensifying: land already connected to reliable power is commanding a premium, as developers try to avoid the off-grid infrastructure struggles and community fights now common to the sector 8.

Taken together, Lancaster County's deliberations reflect a national inflection point, where the same forces fueling explosive data center growth — cheap land, available power, AI demand — are now generating the friction that could reshape where and how the industry builds next.