Voters in parts of Maine will decide whether they want to temporarily ban data center construction next week, joining a growing list of municipalities pre-emptively blocking the controversial projects.
At least seven towns in Maine will weigh temporary moratoriums on Nov. 3, and one, North Berwick, will vote on an outright ban on data centers. An analysis by The Maine Monitor found at least 21 municipalities have already adopted similar ordinances.
Plans to build new data centers, which power a variety of electronic functions including artificial intelligence, are facing bipartisan backlash nationally. Opponents point out that the projects are often energy and water intensive.
The Maine Legislature passed what would have been a first-in-the-nation moratorium on data center development in April. Gov. Janet Mills vetoed the bill to save a data center project in Jay, which has since stalled.
All three candidates hoping to replace Mills as governor have said they would have signed the legislation, which is likely to resurface during the next year’s legislative session. In most towns, active or proposed moratoriums could last until the spring, buying them time until the state can weigh in.
Some towns, such as Lewiston and Eastport, created data center ordinances in response to project proposals. But most towns weighing bans are trying to preempt projects that may never materialize.
Data center developers in Maine and elsewhere have kept their plans under wraps. Officials in Jay only learned of the plan to build a data center in the town’s former mill after The Bangor Daily News reported on the project.
Some towns have received advice from Maine Conservation Voters, an environmental group, when creating their ordinances. The group began offering to help municipal officials move against data centers after Mills’ veto.
That group is also working on data center regulation proposals for the next legislative session, which begins in December.
The cities and towns voting on data center bans on Nov. 3 are: Brownfield, Eliot, Freedom, North Berwick, Peru, Sabattus, Wells and Wiscasset. You can find more information about those proposals, and the measures that have already passed, by clicking on each municipality in the map below.
Maine Monitor writers Caitlin Andrews, John Forbes, Ben Hanstein, Melissa Razdrih and Stephanie McFeeters contributed reporting.
Daniel O’Connor is a Report for America corps member who covers rural government as part of the partnership between The Maine Monitor and the Bangor Daily News, with additional support from BDN and Monitor readers.