LANSING, Mich. (WZMQ) – Senate Democrats unveiled a seven-bill package Thursday aimed at placing new restrictions on large-scale data centers, saying the legislation would protect ratepayers, water resources, workers, and local communities as demand for artificial intelligence continues to grow.
Lawmakers described the package as an effort to establish some of the strongest data center regulations in the country before hyperscale facilities become widespread in Michigan.
“We’ve each heard from residents across all of our districts all over Michigan with rising concerns,” Sen. Mallory McMorrow (D-Royal Oak) said. “People feel like AI and data centers are arriving faster than anyone can keep up. They’re worried about their energy bills. They’re worried about the water. And mostly they’re worried about the decisions that this big aren’t being made without them, that this is something happening to their communities instead of with them.”
The legislation includes seven bills sponsored by six Democratic senators.
Sen. Rosemary Bayer’s (D- West Bloomfield) proposal, Senate Bill 1046, would require permits for facilities consuming more than 550,000 gallons of water per day and cap consumptive water use at two million gallons daily.
“So by putting regulation and restrictions in place on consumptive water use, we are incentivizing companies coming to Michigan to be with us, to have their businesses here, but also to be better stewards and do the right thing to protect our most life-critical resources, water,” Bayer said.
Sen. Mallory McMorrow’s legislation would require large facilities to pay for the energy infrastructure they need and demonstrate they would not increase costs for residential customers.
“So my bill draws a hard line. No Michigan resident will pay a single cent more because a data center came to our state. Period,” McMorrow said.
Other bills in the package would require annual reporting on water and electricity use, establish labor standards, prohibit non-disclosure agreements involving public officials and data center projects, require community benefits agreements and prohibit residential ratepayers from absorbing water infrastructure costs tied to data centers.
Sen. Kevin Hertel (D-St. Clair Shores) said lawmakers developed the package after studying concerns raised in other states.
“Across the country, we’ve seen the consequences of letting tech companies build data center after data center without reasonable guidelines,” Hertel said. “And so the work we are doing here now is to make sure that any data center built here in the state to this size will be holding it to these regulations. And I think the legislation that we are putting forward today puts some of the strictest requirements on data centers anywhere in the country.”
Lawmakers said they are not pursuing a statewide moratorium on data center projects, arguing local communities should use zoning ordinances and temporary moratoriums if they need additional time to prepare.
Senators also said they hope Republicans will support the package, noting that concerns about data center development have emerged on both sides of the aisle.
The bills have been introduced but have not yet received committee hearings.
