This week, New Jersey ordered the operator of one of the East Coast’s largest planned data centers to pay a $1.1 million fine for secretly installing and operating gas generators in violation of the state’s Air Pollution Control Act.
DataOne got hit with the fine after an investigation by The Guardian and Floodlight News in August shared thermal drone footage showing that 45 of the 62 gas generators were operating. None of the generators had permits required for generators with 37-kilowatt capacity or higher, despite running at 1,982-kw capacities more than 50 times higher than the state limit.
States track gas generators like DataOne uses because they emit “carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxides, carbon monoxide, and other combustion-related pollutants,” officials from New Jersey’s Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) noted. Those pollutants can worsen asthma, trigger heart attacks, and cause early deaths.