A bill passed out of committee in the state Legislature aims to keep tabs on large data centers’ water use.
HB76, sponsored by Rep. Jill Koford, R-Ogden, would require data centers larger than 10,000 square feet to report to the Division of Water Rights annually their water use and project future use, plus their water conservation measures. New data centers would need to report their projections prior to the start of construction. The division then would report nonproprietary information at its public website.
The bill was advanced from the House Economic Development and Workforce Services Committee to the full House by an 8-0 vote.
Koford said studies estimate that worldwide water use of data centers total “trillions and trillions” of gallons. The National Security Agency’s Utah Data Center in Bluffdale uses about 23 million gallons per month, while another center in West Jordan uses 85,000 gallons in that time, she said.
“Utah is a desert. We need to be smart about our water,” Koford told the committee. “This [bill] is just one way that we can actually, I think, set the standard for the nation in reporting and transparency in a really important industry and not be overly regulatory or burdensome to them.”
“I think this is important,” said Rep. Troy Shelley, R-Ephraim. “Water is critical on all sides of the state. So I think it’s important. That one caution I would have is just make sure that we’re careful on extra regulation. Data centers are critical. … The race to quantum computing and being able to master that is critical to this state, critical to this country. We cannot lose that race, so we need the data centers, but we need it to be responsible. … We have to be responsible with our water as well.”
The substitute bill passed out of committee whittled the square footage threshold to 10,000 from 50,000 in the original bill. An amendment adjusted the time for new centers to report their water use projections.
Data center operators failing to comply with the bill would face fines of up to $10,000 per day.
An Aspen Policy Academy study of Salt Lake Basin data center water use indicates that seven of the 22 data centers in the area used a total of 701.8 acre-feet of water in 2022 but that was down to 265.8 acre-feet for the first half of 2024. One acre-foot equates to 325,851 gallons. The NSA’s Utah Data Center used over 420 acre-feet in 2022 but was down to 152.6 acre-feet in 2024’s first half. Other data centers also showed decreases during that time.
That study said Utahns use, on average, 167 gallons of water per day, meaning the seven data centers used as much water as 3,752 people in 2022, with the NSA’s Utah Data Center accounting for 60 percent.
Koford and Rep. Paul Cutler, R-Centerville and vice chair of the committee, both said that many data centers are using technologies to reduce their water use.
“This [bill] will encourage folks to either upgrade their cooling systems or build to better standards, which I think is a great approach,” Cutler said.
During public comment about the bill, Alta Fairbourne, community water organizer at Utah Rivers Council, expressed concerns about confidentiality agreements between companies and cities affecting the data being reported to the state.
“There’s no reason why we should be incentivizing data centers to come to our state in this time of water crisis,” she said, calling water “a scarce and shared vital resource” in Utah. “Allowing for any secrecy around major new industrial water uses in the second-driest state in the country is an unjustified gift to special interests at the expense of the public’s water during the Great Salt Lake crisis.”
Kaelin Stanley, representing Mormon Women for Ethical Government, said the bill addresses concerns about water usage by large data centers. “HB76 is a “first-step accountability measure that improves transparency and coordination with water providers,” she said. “In addition, the bill increases oversight without restricting economic development.”
Seth Stewart of American Fork has concerns about the fine amount and worries the bill will make it so that small companies cannot compete with “the nationally bankrolled mega-corporations.”
Cutler said a 10,000-square-foot data center could be opened in, for example, a former retail location and “I’d like to make sure that we don’t slow them down.”
As for transparency, Evan Berrett, director of legislative affairs for Eagle Mountain, said water allocation data for data center projects there already is public information. Eagle Mountain has approved over 2,500 acres for data center development, but Meta has not used its full water allocation and other centers will rely on closed-looped systems or non-water cooling systems, he said.
“Fundamentally and ultimately,” Koford said, “this [bill] is an opportunity, I think, for data centers to tell their story. We have data centers who have become good partners. …We’re asking for some projected water use. We’re asking for them to be open and transparent with what I believe is one of the state’s most precious resource, and many, many data centers are pivoting away from large water use. … If the industry is moving that way, we’re asking to know what you’re doing. And that I don’t think should be overly burdensome, especially in a state where we have some challenges with water.”
Cutler called the bill “a great step for Utah.”
“It’s adding transparency,” he said. “And we can’t make good policy decisions if we don’t have good data, and you are helping us get good data on water use. And based on getting data on water use, we can start to make better policy decisions.”