| Yeah this is just completely wrong. Data centers pay sub-market rates for electricity (as well as getting tax relief, generally). Generally, they use so much electricity that more infrastructure needs to be built. Who pays for that? Not the data center. The utility's capex is spread across all customers (sometimes minus the data center). Then the utility needs to generate moer power or buy it from elsewhere. That's typically at a higher rate than it's currently getting, which raises the average cost of electricity for everyone. But again, the data center is getting a discounted rate so you have a water bed effect raising everyone's prices there too. And for what? Maybe a few dozens jobs. The "value" being created is for multinational corporations who likely won't pay anything in taxes for it. Data centers should be taxed for the land value they allegedly create. We have precedents for this sort of thing, most notably imputed rent. So if you spend $300 million on a building that lasts 30 years, that's worth $10M/year+. Then there's all the compute hardware. Assume $700M amortized over 7 years. Well, the imputed rent is at least $110M/year in base costs, so likely $150M+/year. All this adds up to it should have to pay tens of millions (and maybe as much as $100M/year) in taxes. |
Some of the assumption seems valid such as additional infrastructure cost. But I wonder if that is much of anything. I would assume the DC actually paying for the connection. If that is the case additional capex is not spread across consumer.
The other question is that DC provides a decent baseline for electricity usage. Generally speaking that is a good thing. So it is not an additional burden as implied here.
Third being DC is still paying for the electricity. It is not getting subsidised pricing. They may be getting discount wholesale price due to its volume. But it is not like they are selling at a loss while the rest are covered by consumers.
Generally speaking I don't understand why everyone is suddenly against DC. It may be an issue if power generation hasn't been able to keep up. But in most cases so far that is not what is happening here.