Hochul's executive order pauses permits for 50 MW-plus projects for up to a year, a narrower move than the bill lawmakers passed and she hasn't signed.
New York is the first U.S. state to impose a statewide data center moratorium: an executive order Gov. Kathy Hochul signed Tuesday immediately halts new environmental permits for projects of 50 megawatts or more and can hold for as long as a year.
The pause is meant to give the state time to write rules that shield residents from higher utility bills and the environmental toll of data center growth. During the year, officials will prepare a Generic Environmental Impact Statement weighing the facilities' energy demand, their draw on water and its quality, and air quality. "As data center development threatens to hike up utility bills, deplete our natural resources, and create uncertainty for New Yorkers, it's my responsibility to take action and lead," Hochul said in a statement.
The order reaches less far than the version state lawmakers wanted. Its 50-megawatt trigger sits above the 20-megawatt threshold in the moratorium bill the legislature has already passed. Hochul's office said the higher bar is designed to leave smaller operations alone, such as the data centers run by hospitals, and said it could not immediately give a count of how many pending proposals the order touches.
That tougher bill, the Responsible Data Center Development Act, cleared the legislature in June but Hochul has not signed it into law. It would set the lower 20-megawatt threshold, establish new electric and water rate classes for data centers, and require a public hearing before any future permit is approved. A Hochul staffer called the measure complicated on a press call and said the executive order was the fastest way for the administration to act now.
The permit pause is one piece of a wider push. Hochul plans to seek legislation repealing the state's sales-tax exemptions for data centers, and she has directed the Department of Public Service to consider a mechanism that would require operators to invest in New York's aging grid.
Other states are moving too, though not in step. Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs signed a three-year moratorium on new data center tax breaks last month, while Maine's governor vetoed a similar bill in April, a decision that kept Maine from being the first state to enact such a measure.