How does a data center company obtain a license to poison New Mexicans? The first step appears to be feigning ignorance of basic arithmetic and hoping the New Mexico Environment Department (NMED) is too distracted by industry dollars to notice.
In November, Acoma, LLC — a company that didn’t exist in New Mexico before last October — submitted air quality applications to the NMED for two natural gas-powered microgrids. These microgrids would generate and transport energy to Project Jupiter, a hyperscale AI data center under construction just outside Sunland Park.
Sunland Park, Santa Teresa, and greater El Paso would be directly impacted. Sunland Park is a designated nonattainment area — air pollution already exceeds federal standards and threatens local families’ health. If approved, these microgrids would spike air pollution by thousands of tons annually in toxic chemicals including nitrogen oxides and volatile organic compounds…