The pushback against booming data center construction continues to grow, even as the state’s grid operator warns of rolling blackouts in West Texas if new transmission lines aren’t built, the Texas Standard reported.
Dozens of legislators and state officials have been calling for scrapping the transmission buildout so the Legislature can reassess, while Gov. Greg Abbott’s announcement of an audit of all data centers to be connected to the grid has forced the Electric Reliability Council of Texas to pause construction of the lines.
“Whatever the complexities of the policies engaged here — and the degree to which the deployment of these high-capacity power lines and the construction of data centers are distinct issues — in this moment, it’s the politics that matter at least as much as the policy,” said Jim Henson, director of the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas at Austin.
