Data Center Moratorium Tracker 2026
Last updated: August 9, 2026, , 14:00 UTC | Update cadence: Weekly (every Sunday); with same-day entries for votes affecting 500 MW or more of announced capacity | Maintained by: Axis Intelligence Research & Aidan Jad
Quick Answer: How Many US Jurisdictions Have Blocked or Paused Data Centers?
This tracker logs 10 verified formal actions across nine jurisdictions and one federal bill, from Hill County, Texas in May 2026 through Montgomery County, Maryland on July 28, 2026. Eight carry a restriction score. The Axis Moratorium Severity Score™ (MSS™) national mean across those eight stands at 61.3 of 100 as of August 9, 2026 — the inaugural baseline reading.
Key Findings
- Axis Intelligence Research records 10 formal data center restriction actions in its verified entry log as of August 9, 2026, spanning six states and one federal bill.
- According to the Montgomery County Council, Expedited Bill 19-26 bars the Department of Permitting Services from issuing data center permits for 18 months and applies to applications filed before as well as after the bill’s effective date.
- San Marcos, Texas carries the highest single-entry Axis MSS™ reading in the log at 77, reflecting an indefinite citywide prohibition rather than a timed pause.
- Per the Linn County Board of Supervisors, its 18-month moratorium covers rezoning applications into the EU-3 Large-Scale Data Center district and does not bind the cities inside the county.
- Axis Intelligence Research finds that county-level actions account for six of the eight scored entries, making the county board — not the statehouse — the decisive venue in this dataset.
How We Curate This List
Definitions are the methodology, so they come first.
What counts. A formal, recorded action by a government body or a project sponsor that restricts, prohibits, pauses or terminates data center development. Six action types are recognised: moratorium (a time-boxed pause), outright_ban (an indefinite zoning prohibition), project_denial (a rejected rezoning, permit or special use application), application_withdrawn (a sponsor pulling a live application under documented public pressure), ordinance_restriction (binding conditions short of a pause), and bill_introduced (a filed but unenacted state or federal measure).
What does not count. Non-binding resolutions of concern. Petition drives with no vote scheduled. Delays attributable to interconnection queues, supply chain or financing rather than public opposition. Rumoured or reported-but-unvoted proposals. Opinion pieces, advocacy blog counts, and aggregate tallies we cannot decompose into individually sourced actions.
Two rows in the log carry no severity score by design. Manatee County’s direction to staff (DCM-0002) is a recorded vote but places nothing in force. Ohio’s failed ballot qualification (DCM-0007) is an opposition setback, logged because a tracker that only records wins is an advocacy page. Both are excluded from the MSS™ mean, and the exclusion is stated in the CSV’s method_note column rather than hidden.
Sourcing. Every entry carries a source URL fetched on the retrieval date. Where the entry rests on regional reporting rather than a council record we have opened ourselves, is_primary is set to no and verification_flag reads pending_primary. Six of ten entries currently carry that flag. We publish the flag rather than the illusion of completeness — the ordinance text is the target, and each flag clears as the underlying record is retrieved.
A note on the national counts you will see elsewhere. Several trackers cite figures in the hundreds of moratorium instruments nationwide. We do not restate those numbers, because we cannot decompose them into individually sourced rows, and an aggregate we cannot audit is not a fact we can defend in twelve months. Our count is smaller and slower on purpose. It is also checkable line by line.
The Axis Moratorium Severity Score™ (MSS™)
Counting actions treats a 45-day pause and a permanent citywide ban as the same event. They are not. MSS™ scores each entry from 0 to 100 across four additive components:
| Component | Values | Max |
|---|---|---|
| Action type | ban 40 · moratorium 30 · denial or withdrawal 20 · ordinance restriction 15 · bill introduced 5 | 40 |
| Duration | indefinite or ≥24 months 25 · 12–23 months 18 · 6–11 months 10 · <6 months 5 · not in force 0 | 25 |
| Scope | federal or statewide 25 · countywide 18 · citywide 12 · single project 6 | 25 |
| Reach into pending applications | applies to already-filed applications 10 · does not, or unclear 0 | 10 |
Methodology v1.0. Worked example, Montgomery County: moratorium 30 + 18 months 18 + countywide 18 + reaches pending applications 10 = 76.
National mean, August 9, 2026: 61.3 — the sum of the eight scored entries (490) divided by eight, or 61.25, rounded. This is the baseline reading. It is not high or low relative to anything, because nothing preceded it.
What the score deliberately does not capture: megawatts blocked (sponsors rarely disclose comparable load figures at application stage), litigation risk, and the probability that a pause converts into a permanent ordinance. Where duration or pending-application reach is unclear in the record, the component scores zero — the index understates rather than inflates.
Data Center Moratoriums and Bans by Jurisdiction: Full Entry Log
Reverse chronological. Every entry links to the source fetched at entry time.
July 28, 2026 — Montgomery County, Maryland · 18-month moratorium · MSS™ 76
The County Council approved Expedited Bill 19-26, barring the Department of Permitting Services from issuing data center permits for 18 months, alongside zoning text amendment ZTA 26-01, which defines hyperscale data centers and prohibits them in the county for now. The 18-month term is a negotiated midpoint between a six-month bill and a two-year bill. The council’s own release states the moratorium reaches applications submitted before the effective date, applications pending regulatory review, and approved projects whose building permit has not yet issued — the reason this entry scores the full retroactivity component. It codifies an executive order issued in June. Source: Montgomery County Council news release, July 28, 2026 (primary).
July 28, 2026 — Manatee County, Florida · Direction to draft · not scored
Commissioners voted unanimously to direct staff to prepare a moratorium ordinance covering data centers and other facilities with substantial electrical, water or wastewater demand. Nothing is in force. Logged as pending, excluded from the index, and carried here because the drafting instruction is the leading indicator that precedes most entries above it. Source: Business Observer, July 29, 2026 (secondary — pending_primary).
July 14, 2026 — Imperial County, California · 365-day moratorium · MSS™ 76
Supervisors unanimously extended a 45-day urgency ordinance to a full year while an advisory board develops development rules. The mechanism is worth noting for anyone reading the entry as a hard stop: the county continues to receive and process applications but cannot issue approvals. Public health, energy and water demand drove the vote. Source: inewsource, July 14, 2026 (secondary — pending_primary; ordinance text sought).
July 7, 2026 — Prince George’s County, Maryland · Two-year moratorium · MSS™ 73
The longest pause in Maryland. The council adopted a two-year moratorium on new hyperscale development, with an escape hatch: comprehensive zoning legislation, if enacted, lifts it early. Three members abstained and one voted no on the length rather than the principle. The vote traces back to a hyperscale proposal at the shuttered Landover Mall site and follows an executive permitting pause from September 2025. Source: Maryland Matters, July 8, 2026 (secondary — pending_primary; council record sought).
July 1, 2026 — Linn County, Iowa · 18-month moratorium · MSS™ 66
An 18-month pause on new applications to rezone into the EU-3 Large-Scale Data Center district, running to 11:59 p.m. Central on January 1, 2028, and extendable or endable early by the board. Two structural limits matter. It binds only unincorporated land — the county has no zoning jurisdiction over its cities. And it applies to new applications, so it scores zero on retroactivity. The vote was not unanimous; the dissenting supervisor argued the February 2026 ordinance, with its independent water study and binding water use agreement, already carried the protections. Source: Linn County Board of Supervisors news release, July 1, 2026 (primary).
July 1, 2026 — Hoffman Estates, Illinois · Application withdrawn · MSS™ 26
The developer behind the 186-acre Plum Farms proposal notified the village it was withdrawing its rezoning request, days after the Plan Commission voted 4–2 to recommend denial and days before the Village Board was due to vote. The same sponsor had a proposal rejected in Naperville in January. Two sites, months of process, nothing built — which is the pattern this tracker exists to record, because a withdrawal leaves no ordinance behind and vanishes from every count that only tallies enacted law. Source: Capitol News Illinois, July 2, 2026 (secondary — pending_primary).
July 1, 2026 — Ohio · Ballot initiative failed to qualify · MSS™ 0
A proposed constitutional amendment to ban data centers above 25 MW did not gather the signatures required for the 2026 ballot. Backers have signalled a 2027 attempt. Logged as a failed action and excluded from the mean. Source: datacenterbans.com, retrieved August 9, 2026 (secondary — pending_primary; Ohio Secretary of State filing record sought before this entry is considered settled).
June 24, 2026 — Federal · AI Data Center Moratorium Act of 2026 · MSS™ 30
The House companion to the Sanders–Ocasio-Cortez bill was introduced with nine cosponsors, proposing a federal moratorium on new AI data centers until national safeguards on safety, utility costs and environmental impact are in place. It scores 30 — federal scope, no duration component, introduction-stage action type. Introduced is not enacted, and the score says so. Source: Office of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, June 24, 2026 (primary).
June 16, 2026 — San Marcos, Texas · Citywide ban · MSS™ 77
Council voted 4–3 to amend the Land Use Matrix so that data centers are ineligible in every zoning district — the first Texas city to do so, and the highest-scoring entry in the log because the prohibition is indefinite rather than timed. It followed February’s 5–2 denial of a land use change for a roughly 200-acre proposal, and reversed a near-identical amendment that had failed in March. The mayor voted against, preferring to keep the option open. The Data Center Coalition called the move a signal that the city is closed for business; other Texas cities have since asked San Marcos how it intends to defend the ordinance. Source: The Texas Tribune, June 30, 2026 (secondary — pending_primary; Ordinance 2026-08 text sought).
May 12, 2026 — Hill County, Texas · One-year moratorium · MSS™ 66
Commissioners Court voted 3–2 for a one-year pause on data center construction in unincorporated areas — reported as the first such action by a Texas county — after opposition to a proposed 300-acre Provident Data Centers project. Texas counties hold thinner land use authority than cities, which is the open legal question sitting underneath this entry. Source: Brockovich AI Data Center Reporting, retrieved August 9, 2026 (secondary — pending_primary; Commissioners Court minutes sought).Archive — entries before May 2026
No entries yet. This tracker’s log opens with Hill County, Texas on May 12, 2026. Pre-May 2026 actions are being retrieved and will be backfilled with primary sources rather than imported from secondary aggregations; each will enter the archive with a full provenance row.
What the Pattern in This Dataset Actually Shows
Six of eight scored entries are county actions. That is the finding, and it runs against the way this story is usually told. Statehouse moratorium bills get the coverage; county boards get the outcomes. The federal bill in this log scores 30 and binds nothing. Montgomery County scores 76 and stopped permit issuance the day it passed.
The second pattern is retroactivity, and it is where the real money sits. Only two entries — Montgomery County and Imperial County — reach applications already in the pipeline. For a sponsor with a filed application, a moratorium that grandfathers pending work is an inconvenience. One that captures it is a write-off. That single component separates a pause a developer can wait out from one that kills a project, and it is almost never in the headline.
Then there is Hoffman Estates. A withdrawal is not law, leaves no ordinance to cite, and disappears from any count built on enacted instruments — but the site is just as unbuilt as the one in San Marcos. Recording withdrawals alongside bans is the reason this log’s numbers will not match anyone else’s, and the reason we publish the inclusion criteria before the entries.
What would move the baseline: any statewide enactment, which would introduce a 25-point scope component that nothing in the current log carries; or the first conversion of a timed moratorium into a permanent prohibition, which would shift an entry from 66 to the high 70s on duration alone. Both are live possibilities before this metric’s first quarterly reading.
About This Dataset
data-center-moratorium-tracker-august-7-2026.csv contains all 10 entries with 23 columns, including the four MSS™ components, is_primary, retrieved_date, and verification_flag. Licensed CC BY 4.0.
Citation: Axis Intelligence Research, Data Center Moratorium & Opposition Tracker, 2026.
Related: Data Center Electricity Demand Tracker — the load side of the same story. This tracker records the consent side.
Review trigger: weekly sweep; immediate update on any statewide enactment, any federal committee action on the AI Data Center Moratorium Act, or any single action affecting 500 MW or more of announced capacity.
Corrections: [email protected]
Frequently Asked Questions
How many US jurisdictions have banned or paused data centers?
This tracker records 10 individually sourced formal actions across nine jurisdictions and one federal bill as of August 9, 2026. Larger national counts circulate, but Axis Intelligence Research restates only figures it can decompose into individually sourced rows.
Which US city was the first to ban data centers outright?
San Marcos, Texas voted 4–3 on June 16, 2026 to make data centers ineligible in every zoning district, reported as the first Texas city to do so.
What is the Axis Moratorium Severity Score™?
A 0–100 index scoring each logged action on type, duration, geographic scope, and whether it reaches already-filed applications. The formula is published above and reproducible from the CSV.
Does a moratorium stop projects already under review?
Only if it says so. In this log, just Montgomery County and Imperial County reach pending applications; the Linn County pause applies to new rezoning applications only.
Is there a federal data center moratorium?
No. The AI Data Center Moratorium Act of 2026 was introduced in both chambers but has not been enacted.