Do they even come with jobs? Small towns fend off AI data centers

The battle over AI data centers is intensifying across rural America as small towns organize to resist these massive facilities. Communities in Missouri, Indiana, Virginia, and several other states are mobilizing against what they see as industrial intrusions that strain local infrastructure while providing minimal benefits. This grassroots resistance represents a significant challenge to tech companies’ expansion plans and highlights the growing tension between AI’s rapid advancement and its physical infrastructure requirements.

The big picture: Small-town residents are increasingly pushing back against the construction of resource-intensive AI data centers in their communities, forming grassroots campaigns that share tactics across state lines.

• The facilities powering AI development have become targets of local opposition due to their size, noise, and enormous consumption of electricity and water resources.
• Rural areas in states like Indiana, Virginia, Missouri, and Illinois have been particularly targeted by tech companies seeking cheap land and tax incentives.

Why this matters: The resistance threatens to slow AI infrastructure expansion in precisely the affordable locations tech companies covet for their operations.

• In Indiana alone, two data center proposals were rejected in the past month, with five more rejections occurring in the previous year, according to a Heatmap investigation.
• Local infrastructure designed for small towns cannot easily accommodate the massive resource demands of modern data centers.

What they’re saying: Activists who have successfully blocked data centers are now coaching others in the growing resistance movement.

• “Hyper scale data centers bring few benefits to communities,” claims Peaceful Peculiar, a group that successfully repelled a Diode Ventures data center in Missouri last October.
• “We don’t want to be the next Data Center Alley,” said Wendy Reigel, an Indiana organizer referring to northern Virginia’s concentration of over 50 data centers.

Behind the numbers: Local residents themselves—rather than larger organizations—have proven to be the most effective defense against data center development, despite the considerable resources available to tech corporate interests.

• The fragmented nature of small towns makes localized, citizen-led resistance particularly important in these battles.
• Successful campaigns like Missouri’s “Don’t Dump Data on Peculiar” have become resources for activists in other states including Idaho, Georgia, and Texas.