Massive new data centers are the physical foundation for tech companies’ hopes and dreams for AI. But the rush to expand warehouses full of energy-hungry servers has also kicked up fights across the world over their impact on power grids, utility bills, nearby communities, and the environment. From audacious plans to launch data centers into space to the latest legal battles over pollution, The Verge has the biggest news and reporting surrounding data centers. 43 percent of Americans blame data centers as a major reason for rising power bills. A 40,000-acre data center project was just approved in Utah, despite outcry from the community.

A political battleground is forming around data centers. Are AI data centers coming to your area? Data centers will soon have to complete “mandatory” energy usage surveys. “A data center should not be a potential death sentence for a community’s health.” Iran threatens OpenAI’s Stargate data center in Abu Dhabi Senators are pushing to find out how much electricity data centers actually use Arm’s first CPU ever will plug into Meta’s AI data centers later this year Lake Tahoe has to look for a new power source as data center demand soars. How the…