12Energy & infrastructureBelow the top 20
Municipal capture by a single campus
CapabilityImpact domainBoth
Statement (NASA form)
Given that some towns now have one data-centre taxpayer and one set of ratepayers, there is a possibility of local government unable to refuse the next hall or the next line resulting in a public that lives next to a plant it cannot govern.
Likelihood
3Probable
Consequence
3Major
Urgency
3Priority
A company town with GPUs is still a company town.
Composite 12 = 3×3 + 3
Applicable mitigations
Controls · Siting only where spare water and firm power already exist · Closed-loop cooling as a permit condition · Training load pays its own interconnection and water · Broader ownership of the complementary stack · Transition income tied to measured displacement, not rhetoric · Windfall and compute taxes earmarked for the displaced · Pre-certified civic ranker audits