Americans are increasingly concerned about the environmental impact of
AI, new poll finds
[September 16, 2026] By
ADITHI RAMAKRISHNAN and LINLEY SANDERS
On the way home from a recent trip, Eriech Tapia drove past a sea of
dark industrial buildings lining an already jam-packed northern Virginia
road: data centers.
“It was interesting to see how many were going up,” said Tapia, a
30-year-old Republican from Arlington, Virginia, who works in higher
education advocacy and policy. He said the data centers lend valuable
computing power that can help keep the U.S. competitive with other
nations, but he also worries about how much electricity they use.
Like Tapia, Americans have grown more concerned about the environmental
impacts of artificial intelligence over the last year, according to a
new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs
Research and the Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago.
The survey data say about half, 53%, of Americans are “extremely” or
“very” concerned about artificial intelligence's environmental impacts.
That is up from 41% last year. Democrats are driving much of the
increase in environmental concern, but the poll also reveals broader
worries about the local impact of data centers, which power AI and cloud
computing.
“We're undertaking a massive experiment in real time, and I don't think
there'll be any putting the milk back in the bottle. Change is scary,
and I think some of that is being reflected here,” said Michael
Greenstone, who directs the University of Chicago institute that
collaborated on the survey.
Rising concern among Democrats about AI's environmental impact
There are thousands of data centers in the U.S. with construction
planned for more. Those include smaller, conventional centers that have
been around for decades, as well as larger hyperscale ones that are
being built to serve artificial intelligence’s added processing needs.
Virginia and Texas have the most facilities currently in operation, and
other top contenders include California, Ohio and New York.
While 87% of existing data centers are in urban areas, most new data
centers are planned for rural areas, according to a Pew Research Center
analysis from earlier this year.
“I think that decisions are being made for the company, not for the
community that they're being built in,” said Nancy Antunes, a
60-year-old retired Democrat from Waltham, Massachusetts.
A recent United Nations University report predicted that data centers'
environmental footprint, which already rivals some of the world's
largest countries, will grow rapidly as AI is more widely adopted.
Democrats are increasingly worried about AI's environmental
consequences. About two-thirds of Democrats say they are “extremely” or
“very” concerned about how AI will affect the environment, the poll
found, up from about half in 2025. By contrast, about half of
independents and about 4 in 10 Republicans are highly concerned about
the environmental impact of AI.
Overall, Americans are more worried about the environmental impact of AI
than other industries with a substantial environmental footprint. Only
about 3 in 10 U.S. adults are highly concerned about the impact of meat
production or air travel.
Most Americans support limits on new data centers
While concerns about environmental impacts are higher among Democrats,
there is a broad sense of wariness about a rapid data center boom.
About 6 in 10 Americans support limiting the number of new data centers
that can be built, including most Democrats and Republicans.
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Meta data centers operate, Saturday, Sept. 5, 2026, near Social
Circle, Ga. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)
 “There’s a lot of water usage by AI
data centers that’s taking away from other things like agriculture
and farmers and places that really need it, and people who really
need it,” said 21-year-old computer science student Gedeon Kebede, a
Democrat from Cincinnati, Ohio.
A majority of Americans are “extremely” or “very” concerned about
the impact of data centers on electricity prices or the water supply
in the communities where they are built.
Data centers' use of water to cool AI chips and computers is
“nationally modest but potentially locally decisive,” energy systems
engineer Fengqi You with Cornell University said in an email. While
data centers aren't the U.S.' largest water gobblers, a single large
campus can still place stress on a smaller municipal area.
The centers are also powered by tremendous amounts of electricity,
particularly larger ones, raising concerns about where that energy
will come from. Data centers could account for 11.8% of the U.S.'
electricity consumption by 2030, according to a Lawrence Berkeley
National Laboratory Report.
“We’re talking about building electric infrastructure on a scale of
entire cities, or in some cases, entire states just to serve one
data center,” said Erik Nordman, director of Michigan State
University's Institute of Public Utilities.
About two-thirds of U.S. adults support requiring data centers to
use clean energy sources, such as wind or solar, to supply their
electricity needs. About 8 in 10 Democrats support this, along with
56% of Republicans.
Still, some Americans say data center worries feel distant. Mary
Fisher, 68, hasn't seen any come up in her Jacksonville, Florida,
neighborhood.
“You know, it hasn’t come across my desk as something I should be
concerned about,” said Fisher, who is retired and identifies as a
Republican.
Republicans see more benefits to data centers than Democrats
About a quarter of U.S. adults say data centers are “extremely” or
“very” beneficial when it comes to technological advancement, and
about 2 in 10 say the same about job creation. Many U.S. adults say
data centers are “somewhat” beneficial or aren't sure, while about
one-quarter say they're “not very” or “not at all” beneficial for
technological advancement, and about a third don't see a benefit for
job creation.
“I see a huge increase in the number of temporary construction
workers that are coming to areas, which is vitally important to the
U.S. economy,” Tapia from Virginia said.
Republicans are more likely than Democrats to see data centers'
benefits. But about 3 in 10 Republicans still think the centers are
“not very” or “not at all” beneficial for improved infrastructure
and job creation.
Kebede, the computer science student, said he feels pressured to use
artificial intelligence. Despite his concerns surrounding the
technology, he still wants to be a competitive applicant for the
jobs of the future.
“I think a lot of people just feel that it's very much a bubble,” he
said. “Ultimately, when it pops, it's going to be very detrimental
to everyone, whether you bought into the AI hype or not.”
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