Things big corporations tend to steamroll become enormous issues for rural consumers and businesses, affecting the already high costs of electricity. While there are many reasons power bills have risen, one of them is the enormous data centers used for artificial intelligence that are springing up around the country—and want to be in Delaware County, too!
These data centers use massive amounts of electricity, some as much as a medium-size city. That is bad for the environment, but also has another bad impact, hitting all of us in our wallets.
That’s because to supply the data centers, utility companies need to beef up their power generation, transformers and high-voltage lines. And laws and regulations in New York state allow utilities to add millions of dollars in spending to our bills.
That’s why I was so encouraged to read that our congressman, Josh Riley, has introduced a bill to end this unfair practice. His legislation, with bipartisan support from lawmakers, is designed to ensure these upgrade costs are paid by the data centers and other large customers that need the new power—not families, seniors and small businesses already struggling with rising utility bills.
This is just one reason why I find encouragement from bipartisan initiatives launched in the House to protect us. But there’s an even bigger, more far-reaching one: we need more representatives in the House who are willing to look looking out for our interests, not those of the oligarchs or corporate leaders, leaders who will start putting brakes on Trump and executive office programs which are NOT in our interests!
Pam Guyot
Town of Middletown
