Actually good old Texas Governor Greg Abbott is temporarily halting all new data center projects. >> will last until the state agencies that oversee the Texas grid can audit those projects. >> KBTX Daniel Perrault is in the newsroom and Daniel, the governor basically said these data centers aren’t fully cooperating with the state. >> Yeah, in his letter to the heads of the PUC and ERCOT, Governor Abbott said that those data center companies did not comply with a state survey looking at their water and power usage. He says that them not working with the state and responding has made it a lot harder for state agencies to be able to prepare for and plan for the future.
Governor Abbott is asking the PUC and ERCOT to get information from developers on things like tax breaks they received, power generation and water use, efforts to reduce impacts on the community and ownership. ERCOT says there are more than 1,800 projects seeking connection to the Texas grid. That represents more than 474 gigawatts of electricity, which ERCOT says is more than five times the grid’s record for peak demand. Roughly 90% of the new power requests are from data centers. The governor says that unprecedented demand could endanger the Texas power grid’s reliability and stability.
During a campaign stop in Round Rock on Friday, Governor Abbott said Texans should not have to pay for data centers. >> They must provide their own power, not taking power off the power grid. They actually must be additive to the power grid and along those lines, they must do so in a way that actually lowers the cost of electricity for everybody who is already living there. They must reuse their own water. They cannot be sapping the water from our communities.
>> ERCOT leaders say they are reviewing Governor Abbott’s order and postponing a study to rework the approval process for large load projects. This is the governor’s latest response to the growing public backlash to the rapid build-out of these data centers across Texas. Both Democrats and Republican elected officials have called on the governor to pump the brakes on new data center approvals, including State Representative Gina Hinojosa, who’s running against Governor Abbott in November. >> Data centers are coming in and doing as they please, and the people have no say. They have no power.
And this is happening at a very alarming rate, and people need relief. >> In a statement, Republican Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller said that he is glad the governor acted, but this directive does not solve the problem, saying, “Quote, it’s more of a filter than a break. It may change how projects are reviewed, but it does not stop them. It is not the moratorium that I and Texans across the state have called for. It’s not clear how long this audit will take, how long this pause will last, whether it will be until lawmakers meet again for the start of the next legislative session in January 2027.
But critics say this is a band-aid and not a true pause, which is why you’re continuing to hear those calls for the governor to call a special session so lawmakers could address this now and not wait till the end of the legislative session when legislation is passed, and then it has to take effect, which could be more than a year from now.” In the newsroom, Daniel Perrault, KVUE News. >> A big development about a deep conversation there. Daniel, thank you.
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