While never welcome, the industry has seen moratoria in a number of major global data center markets in the last decade.

Victims of their own success, the likes of Singapore, Amsterdam, and Dublin have all imposed restrictions on new developments amid fears that data centers have grown too much.

In most cases, the blocks were due to concerns over impact to the local energy grid above anything else. In Virginia, the industry’s heartland of Loudoun County has imposed greater restrictions amid pushback from local residents, while neighboring Prince William County is looking to do the same.

Some of those restrictions have relaxed in the intervening years; some have not. But in all those cases, the blocks have come long after the markets have reached critical mass. Dozens of data centers and gigawatts of capacity have cemented each of those markets as permanent digital infrastructure hot spots.

But this year has seen a new trend – the pre-emptive moratorium. Increasingly common in the US, counties across the country are discussing blocks on data center development before ground has broken on the first facility.

Multiple councils across Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky, Kansas, Ohio, Tennessee, Missouri, Idaho, and Pennsylvania have all introduced moratoria of different stripes against data center development or denied ordinance changes that would allow them to be built. Various counties in Indiana have blocked new developments.

There have been near misses in other counties in the likes of Nevada and South Dakota, with officials voting against such blocks. Officials and local opposition groups are calling for similar blockades in many more counties.

Some counties are imposing blocks in the face of developers showing interest in potential sites, others after seeing their first large-scale data center and realizing it’s not for them, and some are imposing new guardrails after seeing neighboring counties get their first taste of data center development. And that’s all before we get to lawsuits from local residents or opposition groups happening in places where officials might be more receptive.

In these cases, concerns go beyond just worries about grid capacity and run the gamut from environmental impact to fears that developments will ruin the very souls of these untouched corners of the country.

Plenty of local counties in the US have brought in pre-emptive ordinances against cryptomining – it’s not uncommon for developers to reassure locals that they’re building colocation or hyperscale facilities that won’t be mining Bitcoin at local meetings – but many are now going for blanket bans for any new large-scale developments of any stripe.

Some of these counties might never have been on any developer’s radar and are just jumping the gun out of fear, uncertainty, and doubt. But others definitely have been seen as a potential home for future projects by data center developers. Amid a crunch when data center operators are hunting for near-term power capacity wherever they can find it, seeing so many ripe greenfield sites blocked off isn’t ideal. So what can be done?

In Virginia, we’ve recently seen one data center developer sue Prince William County board chair Deshundra Jefferson. Ligation against officials to force through developments feels like the wrong move at a time when public perception against data centers is in the toilet. Why add fuel to the fire?

The industry is increasingly building huge developments in areas where not only have there traditionally been no data centers, but no real industrial developments of any stripe. Offering to develop on a brownfield industrial site to replace lost industry is a relatively easy sell by comparison, even if people might have reticence about data centers. Building out gigawatt campuses on farmland in a rural county is a whole different proposition.

I’ve previously written about the importance and need for proactive and productive community outreach. Education – of local officials and residents – is more essential than ever. Each developer will have its own story to tell, its own narrative about how an area will benefit from a new data center campus. But amidst more and more doors being closed and locked before developers have even come knocking, education of local officials and residents is imperative. Get in quick before the opportunity is gone, because getting officials to overturn moratoria will be near impossible in many cases.