09/19/2026
Ohio data center updates
9/17/26 8:36pm
Two developments are worth flagging tonight.
The first is an important update to yesterday's 417–3 House passage of the federal Ratepayer Protection Act: the bill hit a roadblock in the Senate today, September 17. Ohio Sen. Jon Husted sought unanimous consent to pass it, but Sen. Martin Heinrich objected. Heinrich argues that Husted's bill is too weak because it requires state utility commissions to consider cost-protection standards rather than actually requiring data centers to pay their grid-upgrade costs. Heinrich tried instead to advance his GRID Savings Act, which he says would impose a stronger cost-causer-pays requirement; that proposal was also blocked.
That's a useful correction to the picture from yesterday. The House vote demonstrated overwhelming bipartisan agreement that ratepayer cost shifting is a problem, but the fight has now moved to how strong the protection must be. Husted's own description confirms that his bill directs states to consider standards including recovery of the full incremental cost of generation/transmission upgrades and financial assurances if a large-load customer leaves—but it does not simply impose those requirements itself.
The second development is particularly relevant to Central Ohio water costs. Columbus City Council is moving toward a special water-cost structure for data centers and other extremely large water users. At a September 16 hearing, Council President Shannon Hardin put the principle unusually plainly: charging a mega-user only for the gallons it consumes misses the cost of the additional infrastructure that user forces the system to build. Council is considering special rates, charges or fees designed to recover those costs. The proposal received its first reading this week and could receive a final vote at the next council meeting.
That's not theoretical in Columbus. The city says its planned fourth water-treatment plant is estimated at more than $2 billion, alongside additional reservoirs and expansion of existing treatment capacity; Columbus water rates already increased 18% in 2026. Data centers outside Columbus city limits can nevertheless draw from the Columbus water system, which is one reason council is trying to design the charge around infrastructure demand rather than simply zoning data centers within the city.
Council is simultaneously considering mandatory water-conservation planning, decommissioning requirements and regulation of behind-the-meter power generation at large data centers.
That Columbus proposal is the piece I'd watch most closely. It's essentially applying to water the same principle we've been following for electricity: don't merely bill a hyperscale user for the commodity it consumes—identify the infrastructure built because that customer showed up and make the cost-causer pay for it.
9/18/26 9:05pm
There is a significant statewide development tonight: the scale of Ohio's local resistance is now much larger than earlier counts suggested.
As of September 17, at least 138 Ohio municipalities and townships have active data-center moratoriums, and at least 23 communities have effectively banned data centers outright. Another 23 communities across seven counties are considering similar restrictions. Because many smaller jurisdictions don't publish their ordinances online, the actual number may be higher.
That is no longer a scattering of individual zoning fights. It's a substantial statewide local-government movement.
There's also now unusually strong polling behind it. A new Bowling Green State University/YouGov poll of 1,000 likely Ohio voters, conducted September 1–10, found:
78% favor a temporary ban on new data centers while their effects are studied.
75% oppose a data center in their own community.
63% oppose additional data-center construction elsewhere in Ohio.
47% say a candidate's position on data centers is very or extremely important to their November vote.
The university reports a ±3.96-point margin of error.
The combination is what makes this update significant. We now have both behavioral evidence—138 local governments actually stopping development—and statewide polling showing roughly four out of five likely voters supporting the pause.
There's another revealing consequence: developers are reportedly beginning to prioritize what the industry calls “de-risked land”—sites where they expect less community opposition or zoning trouble. Some developers have already abandoned projects following local moratoriums, while others have sued communities including Urbana, Lordstown and Commercial Point after officials reversed course.
That changes the leverage equation. Communities aren't merely protesting anymore; local resistance is beginning to affect where developers believe they can build and how quickly they can get projects online.
I also checked specifically for new PUCO/OCC actions, subsidy changes, beneficial-ownership/foreign-investment disclosures, eminent-domain developments and state legislation. I did not find a new development in those categories today that clears the significance threshold.
