Data centers must now disclose costs and stop hiding bills in your utility rates
H.R. 10139 — Ratepayer Bill of Rights Act of 2026 · Filed by Henry Cuellar (D-TX) · 2 cosponsors · Introduced Aug 24, 2026 · Referred to committee
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What it does
This bill requires large data centers (those using at least 50 megawatts of electricity or 100,000 gallons of water daily) to publicly disclose their resource consumption, infrastructure costs, rate impacts, and public subsidies before they begin operations. It prohibits data centers from shifting their costs to ordinary ratepayers through utility bills, requires independent assessments to ensure water and electricity remain available for households and farms, and establishes a complaint and enforcement process with refunds and penalties for violations.
Why we flagged it
The bill's core mechanism is a transparency and cost-allocation mandate: it requires data centers to disclose resource use and public subsidies, and prohibits them from shifting infrastructure costs to ratepayers. This is fundamentally a consumer/ratepayer protection measure, not a subsidy or deregulation.
What the text implies
- Data centers may respond by locating in states with weaker disclosure or cost-recovery rules, potentially shifting the competitive advantage to less-regulated jurisdictions and creating a race-to-the-bottom in transparency standards.
- The bill's reliance on independent assessments for water and electricity sufficiency may create bottlenecks or delays in data center siting, depending on assessment availability and rigor — implementation speed and quality are not specified.
The full analysis lists 5 implications of this text.
Who it affects
Ordinary citizens gain enforceable rights to know data center costs and impacts before they are locked into subsidizing them, and are explicitly protected from cost-shifting through utility bills. Rural residents and farmers gain specific protections against aquifer depletion and water-supply harm, with compensation rights and monitoring requirements.