How unpopular are large data centers in Wisconsin?
Very unpopular, as 74% of voters in a new poll said they believe the costs of data centers outweigh their benefits.
The poll, released Wednesday by the Marquette University Law School, said opposition to large data centers is up nearly 20 points from the 55% that opposed them a year ago.
For data center operators, the news is actually better than it was a month ago in the Marquette poll, when 78% opposed them.
Opposition to data centers has grown most sharply among independents and Democrats since last October, with 83% of independents and 90% of Democrats now saying the costs outweigh the benefits, the poll said.
Republican opposition increased through July, but has declined by 10 percentage points since then, to 57%, in September.
The so-called hyperscale data centers accommodate artificial intelligence, which is also increasingly unpopular.
The Marquette poll said two-thirds of voters now believe AI is bad for society.
The technology’s growing unfavorability comes as chip maker Nvidia unveiled a new security platform to stop AI agents from hacking and AI executives agreed to self-police their development of the technology.
The poll was conducted Sept. 16-23, interviewing 843 Wisconsin registered voters.
