No AI data centers in my backyard!

The Indicator from Planet Money

NPR

Business

4.7 • 9.2K Ratings

🗓️ 22 October 2025

⏱️ 10 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In the rush to power AI, data centers are popping up in small communities across the U.S. But a growing backlash against this build-out is pitting communities against developers over energy prices and water use. Today on the show, one Michigan community’s fight to stop a data center and what it means for Big Tech.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	NPR.
0:02.0	This is the indicator from Planet Money.
0:13.0	I'm Daryan Woods.
0:15.0	And today, Dustin Dwyer is joining us from Member Station, Michigan Public.
0:19.0	Hey, Dustin.
0:20.0	Hey, Daryan. So, look, I wanted to tell you about this meeting I went to not that long ago.
0:24.2	It was a planning commission meeting for a little place called Pavilion Township, Michigan.
0:29.9	Okay, haven't heard of that town before.
0:31.7	Yeah, you know, I hadn't actually either, even though I live, like, about an hour away.
0:36.0	But so at the meeting, what they were going to talk about was a zoning ordinance amendment to allow data centers.
0:43.5	Yeah, there's a lot of data center talk at the moment.
0:46.7	Yeah, because there's such a huge factor in the economy right now.
0:50.3	These are the massive buildings filled with the computers to power all these new AI models.
0:55.9	And it turns out data centers are a new hot button issue in local government.
1:00.9	So I went to this meeting expecting just like a boring little discussion about this zoning amendment.
1:06.2	But it was not.
1:08.1	The place was packed.
1:10.0	All right.
1:10.3	We call the meeting to order.
1:12.1	So these people, they're all against the data center?
1:15.7	Yeah, all of them.
1:17.5	All right, well, today on the show, the local pushback to the data centers
	...

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