The New York State Assembly held a hearing on Thursday to examine rising energy costs for everyday utility customers tied to new consumers on the electric grid, like artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency data centers. The Assembly Energy Committee addressed concerns that surging demand from these massive energy users will drive up bills for New Yorkers.
The hearing convened just as a new report from the Climate and Community Institute and Public Grids concluded that the design of electricity rates itself—which prioritizes private profit over universal public service—is the core reason for soaring utility bills. Authored by Isaac Sevier and Roshan Krishnan, “Overcharged: The Rules Of The Electricity Affordability Crisis” said that the data center boom merely aggravates flaws that already plague the broken energy system.
The New York Independent System Operator has estimated that the state could be short some 1,600 megawatts of power by 2030, largely because of demand from these new, large consumers of power. The state’s grid operator has 36 current projects in its interconnection queue, a waiting list potentially representing over 10,000 megawatts of new demand. National Grid alone is reviewing 10 active requests totaling 2.28 gigawatts of new demand, with 65% of that coming from manufacturing or industrial projects and 35% from data centers.
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Sevier also warned that one in four New Yorkers struggles to pay their utility bills. He said corporations repeatedly raise rates because they are designed to prioritize their own profits and ignore externalities like pollution. He also underlined the federal government shutdown, costing New York access to financial lifelines like the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program…