Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie is pictured at his seat on the Assembly floor. Heastie said this week that a one-year moratorium on data center permits is likely to be passed this week before the end of the state legislative session.

It may be a case of good news and bad news for the former NRG power plant in Dunkirk.

After news broke Monday that the power plant had been sold to Genover, a firm focused on responsibly redeveloping legacy industrial properties. One of the projects referenced by Genover included a power plant in the State Line Generating Station in Hammond, Ind. that has been converted into the Digital Crossroad Indiana Data Center located on Lake Michigan.

If a similar conversion is in the cards for Dunkirk’s power plant it may have to wait at least a year.

Legislation introduced Monday (A.11560/S.10642) would place a one-year moratorium on any state-issued data center permits, require utilities to establish an independent classification of service for large data centers; set energy efficiency goals for data centers; provide for benefits for host communities; and set labor standards for the construction of data centers. The state legislative session ends Friday, but Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie told Albany reporters on Tuesday that the data center moratorium is expected to be approved.

Heastie told the NY State of Politics that the bill shortens a previously proposed three-year moratorium while combining aspects of other legislation that had been introduced earlier in the legislative session.

“We intend to pass it,” Heastie said. “It was a combination of a number of bills. I’d say it was more of an omnibus bill. But between the two houses, we talked to some of the other stakeholders, so I think we’re comfortable passing that bill.”

As part of the NRG feasibility and reuse study and alternatives analysis from June 2021 that was prepared for the city of Dunkirk and Chautauqua County, a data center and industrial redevelopment with a data center were two of the preferred re-use concepts for the site, according to the report. Other proposals included in the report were repowering of the facility, industrial development and a battery storage facility.

A vote on the data center moratorium is likely to be along party lines as the bill has attracted no Republican cosponsors in either the Assembly or Senate. In addition to the one-year moratorium on permits for data centers, the bill requires hearings before a data center permit is issued and requires the Department of Environmental Conservation to prepare

an environmental impact report on data center development in the state. The state Public Service Law would be amended to require each electric corporation, gas corporation and municipality to establish an independent classification of service for large energy use facilities while the state Public Service Law would be changed to require each water works corporation to establish an independent classification of service for large energy use facilities. The state Public Service Commission would be prohibited from approving any change of rates or related updates to a tariff unless a data center proposal includes a service classification for large energy use facilities, and an adjustment mechanism.

State lawmakers are also proposing a new section in the Public Authorities Law authorizing NYSERDA, in conjunction with the federal bulk system operator, the Public Service Commission and the state Climate Action Council to determine reasonable energy consumption efficiency goals for the design and operation of data centers, including the recycling of waste heat, and a new section in the state Energy Law requiring data centers to derive increasing percentages of their electricity consumption from renewable energy systems, either via on-site production or power purchase agreements.

Data centers, including within the Long Island Power Authority service territory, would also be required to provide their host communities with benefits including residential energy technologies and community infrastructure as well as prevent adverse impacts on local waters.

“Data centers disproportionately use fossil fuels rather than renewable energy, with 56% of the electricity used to power data centers coming from fossil fuels, resulting in data centers having an average carbon footprint that is 48% higher than the US grid as a whole,” Assemblywoman Didi Barrett and Sen. Jessica Gonzalez wrote in their legislative justification. “Additionally, a tripling of data centers nationwide would require the equivalent water usage of 18.5 million households just for cooling the servers. This bill would address these issues by pausing the creation of new data centers in New York for one year, during which time the DEC and the PSC would be required to study and report on impacts. The bill also ensures that data centers are paying their fair share of costs associated with

electrical and water infrastructure and provide benefits to their local host communities.”