They had that opportunity, to build up the infrastructure necessary to operate, to build in places where they wouldn't reduce people's quality of life. They chose to do everything they could to squeeze out some extra profit. Requiring good behavior in one specific way wouldn't be sufficient when dealing with such obviously bad actors. They can try again to get the right to build once they've won back the trust of Mainers.

You can call it childish if you want, but a lot of people are unhappy with the economy in general and rising costs in particular. Energy costs are a big part of those rising costs and, like it or not, the AI vendors and their data center projects are an easy target.

I don't think it's necessarily a "backlash" to all the hype but the hype certainly made them a target

Mainers hate seeing wind and solar plants- they consider them to be a massive eyesore.

The people of Maine won't consider "We'll build something you don't like but we'll offset it by building something else you don't like" as a compromise.

Because we already do. Its why electricity costs money. In my area big consumers and producers already pay through the nose to tie into the grid.

What we _should_ be asking is where all the money we paid for infrastructure and upkeep went for the last two decades of decreasing power usage.

The title is misleading. It's not a "ban", just a "moratorium" until November 2027

And your "easy solution" has had a lot of research debunking its efficacy and a lot of holes in it.

https://www.smithschool.ox.ac.uk/news/carbon-offsets-have-fa...

> Why not just require factories /data centers invest in solar/wind/renewables to cover their power usage.

That still doesn't cover making the data centers provide value to the people who live there.

Can we trust them to actually do it? Not to find some loophole? Or to wait until they are established and then lobby to have the requirement removed?

Maybe I misunderstood, but isn't that what they did? Here is the max. power you can draw from the grid, feel free to be more efficient or to produce your own electricity.

That isn't the factories job - that is your utilities job.

I would argue it's childish for data centers operators to act so entitled. This is Maine's decision to make.

Imagine the additional space needed to power a scaled DC with solar. I think the number of people opposing the construction would increase when they release its half the county.

But what's an extra 500 acres between friends.

Why? Because:

1. That renewable energy development is supposed to allow a _reduction_ in fossil fuel consumption, not an increase in wattage used.

2. That investment should already be happening, not subject to some future plans of some holding company or billionaire investor. Keeping global warming at bay is no longer some kind of future concern; and we've begun to see some initial effects of it in recent years - drouts, fires, various kinds of biosphere degradation etc.