Data centers need power—lower-income rural residents pay the price
AI-generated summary As the engines of artificial intelligence, large data centers can consume as much power as medium-sized cities, straining grids and prompting expensive upgrades to U.S. energy infrastructure. New research shows that data centers paid only 38 percent of the infrastructure costs linked to their growth, leaving residents, and especially lower-income and rural households, to shoulder the remaining 62 percent.