Consumer Choice Center · A data storyThe CloudHas an Address
Every time you press play, pay a bill or ask an AI a question, a building somewhere does the work. We followed one click from the couch to the power grid, and asked who really pays for it.
It's a Tuesday night. You sink into the couch, pick a movie and press play.
Before the first frame loads, your request has already left the house.
Hundreds of miles, in a fraction of a second.
It ends up in a windowless building full of servers, the kind of place most people never think about.
Your day,
in data centers
That movie was the last of many trips your phone made today. Most of them you didn't notice.
- 6:45a.m.
Your phone backs up last night's photos.
Safe even if you drop it in the sink.
Cloud storage - 8:10a.m.
You pay rent from the bus.
Encrypted, confirmed and recorded in seconds.
Online banking - 10:00a.m.
A video call from the kitchen table.
Your team is in four time zones. Nobody had to drive.
Remote work - 1:30p.m.
You ask an AI tool to plan dinner around what's in the fridge.
A model trained and running on thousands of servers answers in seconds.
Artificial intelligence - 6:20p.m.
Groceries ordered, delivered by seven.
Prices compared across three stores along the way.
Online shopping - 9:14p.m.
Press play.
No buffering, even in 4K.
Streaming
None of it costs you extra per click. All of it runs on electricity.
of all the electricity used in the United States in 2023 went to data centers.
Demand is growing fast. So every new data center raises the same question: who pays for the power?
Every state,
one chart
Each dot is a state. Further right means more data centers. Higher means pricier electricity. If data centers pushed prices up, the dots would climb to the right.
average home price per kWh
average home price per kWh
Same fuel,
double the price
It isn't the power plants either. Texas and Massachusetts both run mostly on natural gas.
Texas
per kWh for households, 2024
Massachusetts
per kWh for households, 2024
What sets your price is mostly what it costs to get power to your door, and the state rules built into every rate.
Wires and poles
Transmission lines and local grids, paid off over decades.
Pipelines
States with limited gas pipeline access pay more for fuel.
Wildfire prevention
In California, burying lines and hardening equipment adds billions.
State policy
Mandates, programs and subsidies charged through electric bills.
The real question isn't whether to build data centers. It's who pays for the wires.
Several states and utilities now require very large customers to cover the grid upgrades they need. That's the right idea: data centers pay their own way, and households keep the services without the bill.
Make big users pay their way
Large-load rates that put the cost of new lines and plants on the customers who need them.
Build, don't block
Moratoriums push investment, jobs and tax revenue to other states without lowering anyone's bill.
Fix what really drives prices
Faster permitting for transmission and pipelines, and fewer policy costs hidden in rates.
What about
your state?
Explore the full interactive map ↓
Explore the data: every state
Each orange dot is a mapped data center. Virginia, Texas, Oregon, California, and Ohio have the most. Hover over or tap a state to see its details, or switch the shading to compare home electricity prices.
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How data centers benefit consumers
Data centers aren't abstract tech infrastructure. They are the factories behind services consumers use dozens of times a day, usually for free or at low cost.
Everyday digital services
Innovation & tools
Community & economic benefits
Data centers and energy costs: FAQ
Do data centers raise electricity bills?
The state data doesn't show a simple link. In 2026, the 10 states with the most data centers paid an average of 18.4¢ per kWh for home electricity, compared with 19.0¢ in the other states. Local effects depend mostly on who pays for the new power lines and plants a large data center needs. Several states and utilities have created special rates that require very large customers to cover those costs themselves, so they aren't passed on to households.
How much electricity do data centers use?
According to the U.S. Department of Energy, data centers used about 4.4% of all U.S. electricity in 2023. That share is expected to grow to between 6.7% and 12% by 2028, largely because of AI.6
Which state has the most data centers?
Virginia, by a wide margin. Northern Virginia is the largest data center market in the world. Our map counts 389 sites in Virginia, followed by Texas (197), Oregon (128), California (111), and Ohio (92).
Why is electricity so expensive in some states?
The type of power plant matters less than many people assume. Texas and Massachusetts both rely mainly on natural gas, but Massachusetts households pay about twice as much per kWh.7 The bigger factors are the cost of delivering power (transmission lines, local grids, and in California, wildfire prevention), pipeline access, and state policies whose costs are built into electricity rates.
What do data centers do for consumers?
They run the services people use every day: streaming, messaging and video calls, cloud photo backup, online banking and shopping, AI tools, and remote work software. They also pay property taxes that help fund schools and roads, and they bring investment in fiber and the power grid to the places where they are built.
Methodology & sources
Data center locations: OpenStreetMap features tagged telecom=data_center or building=data_center in the United States, retrieved October 19, 2026 via the Overpass API. Separate buildings on the same campus were merged so each site counts once (1,837 raw records → 1,715 sites). OpenStreetMap is volunteer-maintained, so some facilities are missing and coverage is better in some states than others. Counts are a lower bound and don't reflect facility size or power use. Map data © OpenStreetMap contributors, ODbL.
Electricity prices: U.S. Energy Information Administration, Electric Power Monthly, Table 5.6.B: average residential price, year-to-date through July 2026. Prices depend on many factors, including fuel mix, state policy, and transmission costs. This map shows them side by side but does not measure how much data centers affect them.
Comparisons: The top-10 comparison uses simple averages of state prices. The correlation between a state's number of mapped data centers and its home electricity price is −0.08, meaning no meaningful relationship. Many factors drive prices, so this is a comparison, not proof of cause and effect.
Explainer and FAQ sources
- University of Michigan, Science, Technology, and Public Policy Program, report on data centers (2025).
- Forbes, "What Is a Data Center?"
- CoreSite, "6 Ways Data Centers Impact Our Lives and Communities"
- Consumer Energy Alliance, Florida Data Center Toolkit (2025).
- Compu Dynamics, "Six Benefits Data Centers Bring to the Community"
- U.S. Department of Energy, "DOE Releases New Report Evaluating Increase in Electricity Demand from Data Centers", summarizing Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory's 2024 United States Data Center Energy Usage Report.
- U.S. Energy Information Administration, State Electricity Data: 2024 net generation by state and energy source, and Electric Power Annual Table 2.10 (2024 residential prices: Texas 14.9¢, Massachusetts 29.4¢).
Data updated: November 2026.
Fabio Fernandes
Director of Marketing and Communications, Consumer Choice Center
Fabio Fernandes is the Marketing Director behind advocacy campaigns that make consumer voices heard in the rooms where policy is made.
