A recent state projection shows
Wisconsin will lose more than $2
billion in sales tax revenue
because of an exemption written
into the 2325 state
budget for data centers, a
break designed to promote economic
development.
Three years later, the state is
swimming in new data centers with
consumer concerns about water
and energy usage.
But in a win for consumers, the
Wisconsin Public Service Commission
just ruled that Existing
electricity customers should not
pay a single cent to subsidize
the service of data centers.
The ruling is also a major
win for the Citizens Utility
Board, which fought on behalf
of customers.
Executive Director of Cub, Tom
Content, joins us now with more.
And thanks very much for being here.
Oh, great to be with you.
So you've said that this
case was the most significant
one the CUB has ever been involved
in.
So when the PSC ruled, what was
your reaction?
I was frankly surprised.
I've had a good feeling that we were
going to get some of what we asked
for in terms of significant changes
to what the proposal was,
but we got the vast majority
of our changes or changes
that addressed our concerns.
The commissioners really sent a
message.
Even though they can't control every
cent, they sent a massage that
every dollar needs to be accounted
for, and as
one of the commissioners put it,
every cent should be paid for by
the tech companies.
So how does the proliferation of
data centers in Wisconsin engage
consumers in
a way that other rate cases may not
have?
I think it's a
combination of concerns
about rising energy costs,
because we've already come into this
period with rising energy cost
that have risen at rates higher than
inflation, paired with
the local community reaction
and basically the Wisconsin
reaction, as noted
in the Marquette polls,
to data centers.
And, you know,
the Marquette poll that just came
out. Showed a lot more clarity about
where Wisconsinites stand about data
centers than it showed about who's
running for governor.
And by a two-to-one margin,
people said that costs of data
centers outweigh the benefits.
And I think layered into that is
fear of AI and
what the
impacts of AI are on
the economy and society down the
road. I think that played into it
too.
Because I understand that
thousands of people kind of
came to Cub and said yes,
we want the PSC to rule in this
way.
Thousands of people went to the p s
e hearings uh...
Or p s c hearings or fit submitted
comments online and so those could
have been uh...
People in milwaukee people around
the state we energies customers
and others i mean frankly the
tech companies and the utility uh...
More saying the right things all
along that they were going to uh...
Meet their demand or that
they're going to um...
Play their own way.
But for us the devil was always in
the details and we found some
loopholes and just areas of concern
where we thought the risks that
customers were still going to be on
the hook were too too high with what
was uh...
Well with the proposal
So does the ruling
mean that power company customers
will not be on the hook at all
for the giant energy needs of
these data centers?
They went as far as they could.
They ran into a couple
areas where they couldn't go as
far they wanted because certain
things were out of the state's
control.
And what I mean by that is if
people may have seen that at
the White House, the tech companies
were at the white house
pledging to pay their own way and
signed a rate payer protection
pledge. Now that was more of an
optics document,
a rhetoric document, and it was
non-binding.
But it actually committed the tech
companies to pay their way for all
the network upgrades, which
to us sounds like the power lines,
right? The big power lines.
And the fact is,
our power line company, American
Transmission Company, that is
building $2 billion of
infrastructure to feed these data
centers, is actually regulated
out in Washington D.C.
So the state public service
commission couldn't change
that. And so as a result,
The commissioners sent a message
that they could only go so far, but
they called on ATC
and the WeEnergies parent company
to make changes that
would protect customers from,
frankly, billions of extra costs
tied to these projects.
What else stood out for you from
the PSC on this case?
I think what stood out is that
the...
The fact that the data centers will
be on the hook for 100% of the new
power plants.
There was one scenario where
other customers, small businesses,
homeowners, renters, and
other businesses would be on the
hook up to 25% of the cost
of new power plants, and that's
not a small number.
WeEnergies has already gotten
approval for almost $2
billion in projects and has another
$6 billion in the queue.
So.
A quarter of that would have
been a couple billion dollars on the
hook that customers would have
responsible for.
So that was a big, the
biggest change and
one that we really appreciated.
Well, we appreciate you joining us
today on this time content.
Thanks so much.
Thank you.
Yeah, it almost feels like when was
the last time the little guy?
Exactly.
I know, it feels like
I can't speak
for all my past executive directors,
but in terms of the billions of
dollars that are involved in
this one, versus a typical rate
case, which is maybe hundreds
of millions, but this is multiple
billions, so that's how it
felt good.
Boy, time goes fast on these
interviews, right?
Yes, and thank you for your patience
at the head of it.
Oh, no, no problem.
And if you want to point people to
more resources, we have some on our
website, on our data centers page.
Thank you so much.
Safe travels. All right.
All right, take care now.