Who Pays for Data Center Power? Three Fights From One Day

Who pays for data center power was the real question on Wednesday, 30 September 2026, because that afternoon the Senate failed to advance the bill meant to answer it, by 57 votes to 43 ¹. Meanwhile, the day before, federal regulators froze the emergency auction that the country’s largest grid had planned to open that same morning ². In addition, Amazon signed a 20-year deal for 690 MW from a Maryland nuclear plant it had walked away from building next to two months earlier ^{3, 4}. Finally, towns kept saying no, since our tracker added nine blocked or delayed projects in one refresh, and most of the new moratoriums cover places where no developer has asked for anything ^{5, 6, 7}. Because I run the SAVRN Capital Atlas, these are the three fights that stood out in today’s data.

The numbers behind the three fights

Table 1 holds the figures this post relies on. In particular, each one comes from the vote record, filing, order or report listed at the end, while each one is also in the Capital Atlas.

Fight one: Washington left the power bill unpaid

The Senate vote on H.R. 9340

At first, the Ratepayer Protection Act looked like the easy vote of the season, since the House passed it 417 to 3 on 16 September 2026 ⁸. In short, it amends a 1978 utility law so that state utility commissions must consider standards making data centers and other large loads cover the cost of the grid upgrades they need ⁹. However, the key word is “consider,” because the bill does not require any state to adopt those standards.

As a result, that word is where the Senate split. On 17 September, Senator Martin Heinrich objected to passing the bill by unanimous consent, because it only asks states to consider cost recovery ¹⁰. Consequently, the bill needed a floor vote. On 30 September, cloture on the motion to proceed failed 57 to 43, three votes short of the 60 required ¹. In fact, four Democrats voted yes: Maggie Hassan, Amy Klobuchar, Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock ¹¹. Most Senate Democrats, however, called the bill toothless ¹¹.

In other words, both sides say data centers should pay their own way. Nevertheless, the result is the same as doing nothing, since Congress has passed no new federal protection on data center grid costs before the election recess.

FERC and PJM’s emergency auction

Meanwhile, the second half of the story sits with PJM, the grid operator for 13 states and the District of Columbia. Specifically, its 2028/2029 capacity auction cleared 6,831.3 MW short of its reliability target, at the $325/MW-day price cap ¹². Similarly, the auction before that cleared 6,623 MW short ¹². In PJM’s own words, new supply has not kept pace with rapid large load demand growth ¹².

Therefore PJM proposed a one-time backstop auction to buy up to that shortfall. Under the plan, offers would be capped at $555/MW-day, and every resource would have to be online by 1 June 2032 ¹³. In addition, PJM proposed that new large loads without their own capacity could connect but would be curtailed first in an emergency ¹³.

However, on 29 September, FERC accepted the backstop but suspended it for five months, to 28 February 2027 ². Specifically, FERC found that the cost allocation, the exit rules for transmission owners and the collateral rules for load-serving entities may be unjust and unreasonable ¹⁴. In addition, Chairman Laura Swett wrote that the commission “will not be forced into accepting a deeply flawed, eleventh-hour procurement mechanism with billion-dollar implications for consumers” ¹⁴. Consequently, PJM did not open the auction on 30 September, and it says the timing is to be determined ².

Put the two decisions together. In 48 hours, Congress declined to tell states how data centers should pay for the grid. Meanwhile, the federal regulator declined to let the largest grid buy emergency power under the cost split it had proposed. Both bodies said the question of who pays was not settled, although neither one settled it.

Fight two: the people building data centers are buying the power plants

Amazon and Calvert Cliffs

Calvert Cliffs sits on the Chesapeake Bay near Lusby, Maryland. In 2025 it produced 38% of the state’s electricity, while Maryland still uses about five times more power than it generates ³.

First, in May 2026, Amazon applied to build a data center campus next to the plant, about 2.4 million square feet and roughly 500 MW. Second, on 4 August 2026, it withdrew the application ⁴. Subsequently, Calvert County commissioners passed a six-month data center moratorium on 18 August ¹⁵. Likewise, two days later, the town of Chesapeake Beach voted 4 to 0 to ban data centers in every zone ¹⁶. In fact, in June’s primary, voters had removed all three county commissioners who opposed a moratorium ³.

Then, on 30 September, Amazon came back for the power instead, because it signed a 20-year purchase agreement for 690 MW of the plant’s 1,790 MW ³. Constellation, the owner, says the deal lets it spend $3 billion on upgrades and seek a 20-year license renewal, since the reactor licenses expire in 2034 and 2036 ³. In addition, it expects to add about 190 MW between 2030 and 2032 ³. However, the price is confidential.

The deal cuts both ways, and both sides are true. On one hand, the power still flows onto the PJM grid for every customer, and the plant gets more output and a longer life ³. On the other hand, a single company has now contracted more than a third of the state’s largest power plant for two decades. That happened in the same week Congress failed to settle who pays for grid upgrades. In short, the county said no to the building, while the would-be builder bought the electricity anyway.

Governments and bond markets are paying for the rest

However, Amazon is not alone. On 1 October, South Korea’s industry ministry said Seoul and Washington had formally selected Project Star as the first project under Korea’s $350 billion US investment commitment ¹⁷. Specifically, it is a 6,472 MW gas-fired plant in Encinal, Texas, built for AI data centers, at a cost of $22.3 billion ¹⁷. In addition, Related Companies and NextEra Energy lead it, with first power in 2029 and full operation targeted for 2032 ¹⁷. For scale, that one Texas plant, on a different grid, is nearly the size of PJM’s entire 6,831.3 MW shortfall.

Moreover, the money behind data center growth is not scarce. While going back through SEC filings this week, we added nine hyperscaler bond offerings from February to June 2026 that were missing from the atlas. For example, Amazon sold $37 billion of notes in eleven tranches in March, with maturities out to 2076 ¹⁸. Similarly, Alphabet sold $20 billion in February ¹⁹, while Meta sold $25 billion in May ²⁰. As a result, those three dollar offerings alone come to $82 billion, before counting the euro, sterling, Canadian dollar and yen issues the same companies sold.

The pattern is clear, because capital is easy to find. Therefore the scarce things are power and permission, and buyers are going around the grid and the town hall to get the first one.

Fight three: towns are saying no before anyone asks

The count

First, the count. On 19 September 2026, the atlas held 756 blocked or delayed projects, 495 of them moratoriums. By 1 October, by contrast, it held 837, with 545 moratoriums, across 49 states. However, that growth is partly new action and partly older actions we only now documented, so it is a record of what is on the books, not a weekly rate. In particular, Ohio has the most moratorium rows at 39, followed by Michigan and Florida at 33 each, while Maryland has 19.

This week’s moratoriums

What stands out in this week’s additions is how few of them answer an actual project.

• Dixon, California: On 30 September, the council voted unanimously for a 45-day urgency moratorium on data centers and battery storage. However, there is no data center proposed or operating in the city ^{5, 21}.
• Palm Springs, California: The same night, the city extended its 45-day pause through 25 August 2028, nearly two years ²².
• Mesa County, Colorado: On 29 September, commissioners approved a 12-month moratorium. The county has no pending data center applications ⁷.
• Winneshiek County, Iowa: On 28 September, supervisors voted unanimously for 12 months in rural, unincorporated areas ²³.
• Dover-Foxcroft, Maine: On 28 September, the select board paused data centers for 180 days. Its chair said no proposal is pending ⁶.
• Warren County, Ohio: Commissioners approved six months, although no developer has asked to build in the unincorporated areas, and two townships there already have yearlong pauses ²⁴.
• Pontiac, Michigan: The city is in its second six-month moratorium, which runs to January 2027, with no known data center plans ²⁵.
• Washington County, Maryland: A 12-month moratorium has been in force since 30 June 2026. In addition, its draft rules include a 1,000-foot setback from homes, a 50 dBA noise limit and a possible ban on gas turbines ²⁶.

In short, local governments are writing the rules first and inviting projects later, if at all. In addition, the new standards look alike from place to place: setbacks, noise caps, water studies and limits on on-site gas.

Where the fight moves up a level

When a town cannot say no, the fight moves to the state. For example, in Archer County, Texas, Google’s proposed Project Raptor would cover about 2,500 acres near Wichita Falls ²⁷. On 28 September, the commissioners court passed two resolutions opposing its wastewater permits, although the county judge said the county has no authority to stop them ²⁷. However, the state has paused those permits anyway. On 21 September, Governor Greg Abbott directed Texas environmental regulators to halt all permits sought by data centers until the grid operator finishes its audit, with a compliance report due 19 October ²⁸.

Similarly, money can be stopped. On 25 September, the Wayne County executive in Michigan vetoed $125 million in local tax incentives for Google’s Project Cannoli, a campus of about 1 GW ²⁹. As a result, overriding the veto takes two-thirds of the 10-member commission.

Finally, projects also fade out quietly. In Hamilton, Ohio, Logistix asked the city to study 240 MW of power for a campus on city land. However, the city found it would take at least 24 months to deliver 45 MW, and the study was paused in January ³⁰. Then, on 28 September, the Cincinnati Enquirer reported under the headline “How a $1 billion data center fell apart in Ohio” that the project is not moving forward ³¹.

The other side of the ledger

Not every vote goes one way, however. On 30 September, Kline Township supervisors in Pennsylvania unanimously approved Amazon’s nine-building, 390-acre campus, with a nine-page list of conditions ³². Meanwhile, in Mississippi, Eagle Rock Partners held a public hearing on 29 September for an estimated $6 billion campus on 800 acres in Jefferson Davis County. Residents raised water, power rates, noise and traffic, while some asked for a public vote ³³. In short, approvals now arrive with conditions attached, while hearings now arrive with a fight attached.

How the three fights connect

In fact, these are one fight seen at three levels. First, at the top, nobody has decided who pays for the grid that data centers need. Because of that, utilities and grid operators cannot price the risk, and FERC sent PJM’s attempt back. Second, in the middle, the largest buyers are signing for power directly, through 20-year contracts and foreign-funded plants. Third, at the bottom, towns that see rising bills and no answer from Washington are pausing everything.

As a result, each level pushes the others. For example, a town that says no sends the developer to a power contract. In turn, a power contract that skips the local fight leaves the cost question with the grid. Finally, a grid that cannot settle costs gives the next town one more reason to say no.

How we track this

The Capital Atlas records who is funding data center capacity in North America and what has been stopped. It refreshes three times a week, while every value links to a filing, order or report. In particular, today’s changes are in the 1 October update note. In addition, local pauses are tracked in the moratorium tracker, and stalled projects in the delay tracker.