Data Center Bytes

In the latest episode of Mike Huneke’s Red Flags Rising podcast, Mike and his co-host Brent Carlson interviewed Loyaan Egal regarding important trends in the US Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC’s) use of its “covered list” authorities and what companies should do to anticipate and prepare for future listings and eventual FCC enforcement.

As developers explore placing data centers in low-Earth orbit, proposals for more than 1 million data center satellites are raising novel questions about how US environmental review requirements could apply to infrastructure that operates in space but may produce environmental effects closer to home.

As AI adoption and hyperscale computing continue to drive significant data center growth, companies are facing increasing challenges related to power availability, infrastructure constraints, and long-term energy planning.

Singapore continues to position itself as a leading hub for digital infrastructure development in Asia while balancing demand for data center capacity with sustainability, land, and energy constraints.

The rapid expansion of AI infrastructure, cloud computing, and hyperscale data center development is increasing pressure on data center operators to secure reliable electricity while advancing sustainability objectives. Against this backdrop, renewable energy credits (RECs) have emerged as an advantageous instrument, among other renewable energy strategies.

Among the many considerations for building, operating, and monetizing data centers, a vital aspect is whether the data center owners and customers will be able to export to—and use within—a non-US data center competitive hardware and software, namely the advanced semiconductors used in training and running large-language models.

California lawmakers have recently focused renewed attention on the rapid growth of data centers, driven in large part by cloud computing and artificial intelligence capacity demands. Concerns about grid reliability, electricity costs, and environmental impacts prompted a flurry of legislative proposals in the 2024–2025 session. The result, however, is a more incremental regulatory approach than many industry participants initially expected. This post highlights what has passed, what stalled, and what data center developers and operators should be monitoring going forward.

Tariff and trade policy in the United States is poised to affect nearly every industry, and data centers are no exception. Data centers built in the United States need to be outfitted, and much of that equipment comes from outside the United States and would be affected by US import controls and regulations. Import controls may involve quotas or other restrictions on what may be imported into the country or the imposition of tariffs on imported merchandise. Tariffs that are currently imposed under various trade measures, and anticipated additional tariff and non-tariff remedies resulting from trade investigations, will influence data center construction, hardware manufacture, software development, and energy consumption.

The UK government published on April 1 a policy statement setting out its proposals for the much-anticipated Cyber Security and Resilience Bill (the Bill). The proposals include bringing data centers and managed service providers within scope of the United Kingdom’s cybersecurity regulatory framework, strengthening supply chain obligations for designated operators of essential services, updating technical security standards, and new executive powers for the UK government to direct regulated entities in relation to a specific cyber incident or threat.

While a data center may seem similar to a large warehouse, data centers are high-intensity utility consumers that have special requirements compared to a typical warehouse acquisition project. There are several crucial items to address in negotiating purchase and sale agreements and conducting due diligence of land for the development of data centers.