NEW JERSEY — More than 60 environmental, labor and community organizations called on New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill to impose a moratorium on new data centers that use at least 20 megawatts of electricity until stronger regulations are in place. The advocates plan to deliver a petition signed by thousands of residents supporting the pause of data center construction.

The groups signing the letter include the Pinelands Alliance, the ACLU, the New Jersey Highlands Coalition, The Nature Conservancy and NY/NJ Baykeeper. The organizations said a statewide pause on projects would give lawmakers time to study the industry's long-term impacts and establish statewide protections.

A 20-megawatt data center uses as much electricity as all the homes in Montclair. Data centers are buildings filled with servers and computer systems that process and store digital information. Massive facilities built for artificial intelligence can consume as much electricity as tens of thousands of homes and use millions of gallons of water to cool their systems.

New Jersey has about 80 data center facilities, most of which are concentrated in the northern half of the state, according to DataCenterMap, an industry data tracking website. An AI data center under construction in Vineland, slated to span about 2.6 million square feet, is one of the largest on the East Coast and will provide artificial intelligence computing power to Microsoft under a $17 billion agreement. Residents living near the Vineland site have complained that a constant humming noise has disrupted their sleep.

Monroe Township in Gloucester County and Andover Township in Sussex County have passed local bans on future data centers after residents protested zoning changes they feared could pave the way for data centers in their communities. At least five bills moving through the New Jersey Legislature would place new restrictions on large-scale data centers, including measures aimed at limiting how much residents pay to power the facilities. The bills would require detailed reporting on water and energy use and ban nondisclosure agreements tied to data center projects. The proposed measures would have to be passed by the Legislature and signed by the governor to become law.

In 2024, former Gov. Phil Murphy created New Jersey's first tax incentive program targeting artificial intelligence projects and large-scale data centers. CoreWeave, a Livingston-based cloud computing company, received a $250 million award in tax credits under the program and is scheduled to open a nearly 400,000-square-foot data center in Kenilworth in Union County on the site of a former pharmaceutical company headquarters.

"Data centers are the essential digital infrastructure behind every online purchase, telehealth appointment, online news article, and digital classroom," said Khara Boender, director of state policy for the Data Center Coalition. In 2023, data centers supported more than 96,000 jobs and contributed more than $17 billion to New Jersey's economy, according to the coalition.

At least 14 other states are considering moratoriums or restrictions tied to data center growth, but none have been signed into law, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. By 2030, U.S. demand for data center capacity driven largely by artificial intelligence could more than triple.