According to a report by the British newspaper The Guardian on October 9th, a small town in East Fishes Creek, USA, has issued a three-year ban on the construction of new data centers. This ban means that the town will not consider the construction of new data centers until July 2029.
According to reports, for decades, East Fisherkir has been supporting the development of the tech industry in New York. This small village located 70 miles north of New York City once had a campus covering 460 acres where International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) researched and manufactured semiconductor chips for nearly 50 years.
However, in early 2026, news spread that real estate developer TopTide might be building the largest artificial intelligence data center in the United States in the area. The facility would consume approximately 1 gigawatt of electricity and cover an area of over 1 million square feet, spanning roughly 143 acres. As soon as this news came out, fierce opposition erupted.
Even before any facility planning was drawn up, the current zoning regulations in East Fishkill already prohibit the construction of large data centers. The town has also issued a three-year ban on data centers, stipulating that no new data centers exceeding 20 megawatts should be considered until July 2029, so officials can study their potential impact on water resources and the local ecosystem. The development company at the center of the controversy has appealed against this measure.
The struggle that is unfolding in East Fitchill is just a small part of the growing disagreements. Whether it’s American rural towns or communities that once eagerly welcomed technological development, there is growing doubt: does artificial intelligence infrastructure bring enough local benefits to justify its enormous demands for electricity, water, and land?
"This is not a small town against technology," said Ladford, a resident of the local area. "I am an educator and I also use new technologies."
Protestors from East Fisheskil residents' online images
It is reported that the incident started when Tree Top Development Company purchased local property and initially sought approval for a warehouse project. However, residents later discovered that the company entered the approval process through the local property owner, Donovan Avenue Holdings, to apply for a project that would require approximately 1000 megawatts of electricity—a quantity more suitable for large artificial intelligence data centers rather than warehouses.
This approval request was not submitted to East Fishkill Town, but instead to the grid queue of the New York Independent System Operator (NYISO). The NYISO is an independent organization responsible for managing the high-voltage electricity grid in New York. Any company wishing to build a large new project must formally apply to this organization for permission to connect to the grid.
For the residents of East Fishkill, this request for a utility connection quickly raised concerns. The proposed data center will consume more electricity than Buffalo City, which has a population of about 275,000, while the town of East Fishkill has only 30,000 residents.
Dongfischkil is often described as a “innovation center,” which makes its opposition to data center proposals particularly notable. The town has never been hostile to new technologies before.
In the second half of the 20th century, IBM turned this small town into one of the leading semiconductor manufacturing centers in the country. It employed thousands of workers and laid the foundation for today’s iPark 84 campus.
Residents insist that what they oppose is not new technologies, but rather the unprecedented scale of emerging artificial intelligence infrastructure.
Local residents and county council candidate Fran Karakappa said, “What we really oppose is the scale of the project. The tree-top center will require 1000 megawatts of electricity. People don’t want to pay higher electricity bills because a larger data center will be connected to the power grid and put pressure on the power system.”
The town's skepticism towards large industrial projects is also related to their historical consequences.
IBM's manufacturing business helped solidify the region's technological industrial status but left a long-term impact from groundwater pollution associated with semiconductor production. The area still has several contaminated sites.
In addition to groundwater protection, local residents also worry about noise issues, diesel backup generators, property values, wetlands, and the destruction of the region's rural characteristics.
Tree Top Company is not satisfied with the three-year ban imposed on East Fishkill. In a 17-page letter opposing the ban submitted to the town council, the company’s lawyer argued that the three-year ban was illegal and targeted the company’s property, essentially amounting to a permanent ban, rather than a “legitimate temporary measure.”
The letter states that the company has spent several years and invested significant resources in developing the site, including environmental reviews, wetland surveys, traffic studies, and utility coordination.
