On Aug. 18, 2026, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro signed an executive order<\/a> which he said would place the strictest guardrails in the nation on data centers and developers. The order includes requirements for large data center projects to disclose projected water and energy use and pay for costs associated with connecting to the electric grid.<\/p>\n In July, Philadelphia\u2019s planning commission held an informational meeting in which they identified two potential locations \u2013 one on 3143 West Passyunk Avenue and the other on 2600 Grant Avenue \u2013 where a large data center could be built. Officials have said there are no plans to build a data center in Philadelphia at this time, however.<\/p>\n In response to the meeting, concerned residents and groups have called for Philadelphia to issue a moratorium on data centers. Protesters held a \u201cNo Data Centers in Philly\u201d rally outside City Hall early Monday afternoon, hours before Parker\u2019s announcement on the task force. They urged City Council to pause potential data center development in Philadelphia and establish guardrails.<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t \t\t\t\t\tNBC10NBC10<\/p>\n Protesters gather for a “No Data Centers” rally outside Philadelphia’s City Hall on Monday, Sept. 14, 2026.<\/p>\n \u201cTwo potential data center sites have already been identified in Philly, but right now our city has no rules on how communities should be protected,\u201d organizers wrote. \u201cThat\u2019s a recipe for disaster. City Council can and must pass a moratorium and pause data center construction so leaders and Philadelphians can write strong guidelines to protect our health, affordability, and quality of life. We can\u2019t let an industry that raises our PECO bills, pollutes air and water and powers surveillance expand without guardrails; that\u2019s what will happen if Council doesn\u2019t act.\u201d<\/p>\n Vincent Thompson, communications director for Philadelphia City Council President Kenyatta Johnson, issued a statement in response to Monday\u2019s protest.<\/p>\n “Philadelphia City Council members and Mayor Cherelle Parker’s administration continue discussions on the future of data centers in the city,\u201d Thompson wrote. \u201cAt this time, no legislation or resolution has been introduced in City Council.”<\/p>\n Parker then made her announcement on the data center task force a few hours later.<\/p>\n During an interview with NBC10’s Lauren Mayk for her Battleground Politics podcast<\/a>, Pennsylvania House Speaker Joanna McClinton said that the state “wouldn’t be in a space for a moratorium” on data centers. She also mentioned potential legislation that would continue to place guardrails on data center development in Pennsylvania, however. <\/p>\n NBC10 investigative reporter David Charns toured one of the largest data centers in the country to examine the questions driving the nationwide debate over how they\u2019re impacting the environment and communities. You can read and watch his full report here.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Amid concerns from communities across the country and calls for a moratorium in Philadelphia Mayor Cherelle Parker announced…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":286218,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[69,71,70],"class_list":["post-286217","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia-headlines","tag-philadelphia-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/286217","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=286217"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/286217\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/286218"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=286217"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=286217"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=286217"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Protesters](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Data-Center-rally-.jpg\")
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