Written by Admin Alex · Fact-Checked by M.Ali · Info Verified September 2026
We review and update this article regularly as new information becomes available.
TL;DR: Developers are scouting Philadelphia’s Grays Ferry neighborhood, home to a refinery that exploded in 2019, for a new AI data center. Denver, Indianapolis, Asheville, Charlotte and Reno have already passed moratoriums on new facilities, and New York governor Kathy Hochul signed an executive order freezing new large data center permits statewide. U.S. data centers are projected to burn more natural gas than Germany and Japan combined by 2035.
Sonya Sanders says the refinery killed her husband. He died of a rare bone cancer in 2020, a year after the Philadelphia Energy Solutions plant in Grays Ferry exploded and shut down for good. The site used to process up to 335,000 barrels of crude oil a day. Sanders is now the board president of Philly Thrive, and on September 15 she stood with more than 100 people at a rally called “No Data Centers in Philly,” because developers have quietly identified two potential sites for new AI infrastructure in the city: one in Northeast Philadelphia, and one in Grays Ferry itself.
That second location is the one drawing the loudest objections. Grays Ferry has spent seven years trying to recover from an industrial legacy that residents say already cost lives. Now the same land is being eyed for a different kind of heavy infrastructure, one that needs enormous amounts of electricity and, depending on the cooling system, water.
The Moratorium Map Is Getting Crowded
Philadelphia isn’t an outlier. It’s late to a fight that’s already reshaped zoning meetings across the country. Denver, Indianapolis, Asheville and Charlotte have all approved moratoriums that pause new data center construction while officials figure out rules on power draw, noise and water use. Reno did the same. New York went further: Governor Hochul signed an executive order temporarily halting new large data center permits statewide, saying “progress shouldn’t arrive with a higher utility bill, deleted water supply, or noise pollution.”
Annie Fox, an attorney with the Clean Air Council, has been showing up at these hearings too. The pattern she and others describe is consistent. A developer identifies cheap land, often in a community that’s already carrying industrial scars, and proposes a facility that promises jobs and tax revenue. Local officials, worried about losing the investment to a neighboring county, move fast. Residents find out late.
What 2035 Actually Looks Like
The numbers behind the backlash are not small. U.S. data centers are on pace to consume more natural gas than Germany and Japan combined by 2035, according to projections cited in the reporting on Philadelphia’s fight, nearly double what forecasters expected even a year or two ago. That translates to roughly 1 million additional metric tons of greenhouse gas pollution a day, about 12% of current U.S. emissions.
Those are national figures. Locally, the fight is about something more immediate: who absorbs the noise, the traffic, the strain on the grid, and who gets the jobs. Shawmar Pitts, Philly Thrive’s managing co-director, has framed the Grays Ferry proposal as a test of whether the city learned anything from the refinery years. So far, the answer from residents at that rally was a pretty firm no.
Bottom Line
This isn’t really a story about AI. It’s a story about who gets asked before a 24/7 industrial facility moves in next door, and who doesn’t. The AI industry needs somewhere to put its hardware, and land near power infrastructure in post-industrial cities is exactly the kind of cheap, available real estate developers look for. But those same cities have residents who remember what the last round of heavy industry left behind, and they’re organizing faster than developers expected. Watch Philadelphia’s zoning board. Whatever happens there will be the template other Rust Belt cities either copy or avoid.
