Johnson regulates Chicago data centers, wants moratorium
[August 13, 2026]
By Sean Reed | The Center Square
(The Center Square) – Chicago could soon be one of the largest cities in
the U.S. to halt the development of new data centers large tech
companies continue to invest heavily into the infrastructure backing
artificial intelligence.
As politicians and candidates from both parties have taken aim at data
centers for their large footprint on the power grid and environmental
impacts, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson signed an executive order Tuesday
aimed at data centers within the city’s limits.
The order Johnson directs city agencies to act on regulating current
data centers in the city and established a new task force to create and
update rules in the city’s code related to such regulations.
“This order directs the Department of Environment to strengthen and
modernize the conditions required to obtain an air pollution control
permit and to issue new rules and do it within 90 days,” Johnson said.
While Johnson doesn’t have the authority to outright block the
development of new data centers, he also called on the City Council to
pass a moratorium on them when they return to regular meetings next
month.
“I'm going to continue to partner with city council to ensure that those
concerns that community members have are addressed and that's why the
city council's authority to place a moratorium on data center
development and advancement,” Johnson said.
The order comes just months after the Illinois General Assembly weighed
legislation called the Protecting Our Water, Energy, and Ratepayers, or
POWER, Act, but didn’t advance it before the end of their spring
session.
Johnson said he wants state lawmakers to act on it when they return to
Springfield in November.
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“I'm calling on Springfield to pass the power act because working
families should never be forced to pay higher utility bills to
subsidize the massive energy demands of data centers,” Johnson said.
The POWER Act will likely be a top priority for lawmakers during
their fall veto session, especially as Gov. J.B. Pritzker has pushed
the legislature heavily to pass the law.
Reports widely suggest that as more new data centers come online,
electric grids across the country face strain from the hundreds of
gigawatts pulled by the facilities.
“We have something called the POWER Act that's being negotiated. And
it did not pass in this last session of the legislature. It probably
has a little more negotiation that needs to get done, but it very
much can pass in the next session,” Pritzker said at a climate
summit last month.
The statewide act would expand the required permits to build new
centers, the reporting of energy consumption, payments into
community funds, and plans to save water while bringing new capacity
to the grid.
Denver, Minneapolis and Seattle all passed this year some type of
halt to new data centers construction in their cities.
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