A May 2026 Gallup poll found seven in 10 Americans oppose constructing AI data centers in their local area, as U.S. data center power demand is forecasted to more than double from 31 gigawatts in 2025 to 66 gigawatts in 2027, according to Goldman Sachs Research. In Texas, the Environmental Integrity Project says 32 proposed natural gas-fired power plants could emit more than 287 million tons of greenhouse gases annually if built at maximum capacity. Water demand adds another layer of concern; a 2026 analysis by the Houston Advanced Research Center estimates Texas data centers could consume between 29 billion and 161 billion gallons of water per year by 2030. Local opposition has been especially strong in places like Hood County, west of Fort Worth, where residents have actively fought multiple proposed data center projects.
Texas is expected to be one of the nation's largest sources of new data center power demand, and the scale of proposed infrastructure, including a roughly 5,800-acre campus near Amarillo, signals that grid capacity, water availability, and community displacement are becoming concrete planning challenges rather than theoretical ones. The wide range in projected water consumption, from 29 billion to 161 billion gallons annually in Texas alone by 2030, reflects significant uncertainty in how the buildout will unfold, with consequences concentrated in specific rural communities rather than spread evenly across the state.