Big data centers must pay for their own power upgrades.
H.R. 9655 — FAIR Data Act · Filed by Josh Riley (D-NY) · 2 cosponsors · Introduced Jul 13, 2026 · Referred to committee
Your members of Congress
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What it does
This bill stops electric companies from charging regular people for power upgrades. Small businesses are also protected from these charges. Large data centers must pay for their own upgrades instead. A large data center uses more than 75 megawatts of power. States have one year to make this rule. Electric companies must prove every year that data centers lower bills.
Who it affects
Regular people who use electricity at home are protected. Small business owners are also protected. Large data centers must now pay their own costs.
One thing to notice
Electric companies must prove that data centers lower bills. If they cannot prove it, the rule stops cost-shifting to regular people.
From the analysis of the bill text, linked under Primary records below.
Where it stands
2 cosponsors: 1 Democrats, 1 Republicans.
- Jul 13, 2026 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in House”
- Jul 13, 2026 — Referred to House Committee on Energy and Commerce · Congress.gov: “Referred to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce”
Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.
Words to know
- data centers — Large buildings full of computers that store and process information for the internet.
- megawatts — Units that measure how much electricity something uses.
- cost-shifting — When one group pays for costs that should be paid by another group.
How this was measured
Analysis — Quorum's AI read the bill text published by Congress.gov (7,584 characters) on Aug 12, 2026. Section numbers in the findings refer to that text, linked below; transparency and hidden-provision scores are compared against the median of 14,707 analysed bills.
Status and sponsors — Congress.gov's bill record — actions, committee referrals and cosponsors — loaded nightly. The timeline shows status changes, not every procedural action.
As of — page rendered 2026-09-23.
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