OAKLAND \u2014 While wealthy tech companies are considering opening data centers in Oakland, Councilmember Carroll Fife on Tuesday will propose a 45-day moratorium for city officials to write new regulations around the facilities.<\/p>\n
Fife is proposing that the city immediately halt any approvals for new data center developments until officials can find new ways to regulate them in a way that ensures Oaklanders don\u2019t have to pay the price for them.<\/p>\n
The West Oakland councilmember said she wants to make sure the city protects residents from companies who may exploit the area\u2019s power grid, water supply and other utilities. She also said she wants any developers to be more clear about their plans for new data centers.<\/p>\n
\u201cI still think there\u2019s a responsibility for the developer to be more forthcoming about what the plans are,\u201d Fife told Bay Area News Group.<\/p>\n
With her proposal, the councilmember seeks to give the city time \u201cto develop appropriate development standards and study data centers to properly address secondary negative effects and the business in general,\u201d according to a copy of the proposal<\/a> filed ahead of Tuesday\u2019s Life Enrichment Committee meeting.<\/p>\n Fife added that she wants to be able to position Oakland to benefit economically from a potential boom in the AI industry, instead of outright banning it because of widespread controversy.<\/p>\n Gov. Gavin Newsom on Monday announced<\/a> that he\u2019d signed a string of bills aimed at putting tighter requirements on how AI data centers report usage of resources including energy, water, and land.<\/p>\n The Behring Co., a real estate developer, also recently announced plans for a new 20,000-square-foot data center in a former Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory facility at 415 20th St. in Oakland Councilmember Charlene Wang\u2019s district. As the building was previously used for supercomputing, the company said last month<\/a> its project would not need to follow some permit requirements.<\/p>\n The Danville-based Behring Co. did not immediately return a request for comment on this story on Monday afternoon.<\/p>\n According to the company\u2019s website, the 20th Street location sits in a part of the PG&E electrical grid that provides a flow of electricity from multiple parallel paths instead of one, \u201cso the loss of any one line or transformer does not drop service.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt is the most resilient distribution architecture the utility operates, and it exists here because Oakland built a real downtown a century ago,\u201d Behring\u2019s website states.<\/p>\n Currently, just one data center operates in Oakland \u2014 the 120,000-square-foot Digital Realty telecommunications facility at 720 Second St. near Jack London Square<\/a>.<\/p>\n Protests against new data centers have recently picked up steam around the Bay Area, with some cities crafting their own proposals to halt any construction of them in Oakley<\/a> and Richmond<\/a>.<\/p>\n City leaders in Pittsburg, which approved a data center in 2024, earlier this year created a new advisory panel<\/a> to evaluate that project\u2019s impact on the community. The Hayward City Council in October is set to also discuss its own potential moratorium on data centers.<\/p>\n The Oakland lawmaker told Bay Area News Group she wants to halt new data centers as several billionaire-backed companies look to develop in Oakland.<\/p>\n