In 1993, Erin Brockovich helped secure a $333 million settlement against Pacific Gas and Electric Company—then the largest payout in a direct-action lawsuit—by exposing how the utility had knowingly contaminated groundwater in Hinkley, California. She had no law degree. She had persistence, documentation and an ability to connect dots that others missed.
Thirty years later, the dots she's connecting span the entire continental United States.
After posting a callout on her website asking anyone concerned about artificial intelligence datacentres near their communities to reach out, Brockovich received 3,862 responses within a month. She now maintains an open-source map showing 33 operational AI datacentres across the U.S., 68 currently under construction and 41 in the proposal stage—each overlaid with community concerns submitted by residents who say they were kept in the dark about the developments.
The pattern is familiar: major corporations moving fast, local governments either cooperating quietly or being steamrolled, and communities discovering industrial-scale infrastructure only after permits have been approved and construction has begun.
"This is about transparency and process," Brockovich said. "People have a right to know what's being built in their backyard and why."
The datacentres themselves are staggering in scale. A single facility can stretch across hundreds of acres. In May, Utah approved a datacentre twice the size of Manhattan. These aren't small operations tucked into industrial parks but massive physical footprints being stamped onto the American landscape, often in rural areas where resistance might be quieter.
Brockovich's investigation has uncovered troubling details about the approval process. Developers frequently sign nondisclosure agreements with local officials, preventing public access to records explaining site selection, environmental impact assessments or whether such assessments were conducted at all. When she reached out to local governments, she discovered something revealing: in multiple cases, zoning laws were being changed specifically to accommodate datacentre development.
"I'm getting reports from people where their local leaders are changing zoning laws for this to happen," Brockovich said. "That's not how this is supposed to work."
The financial leverage is undeniable. When Hill County, Texas held a vote on a one-year moratorium to pause datacentre construction after community outcry, developers responded with a $100 million lawsuit. According to reporting by the Texas Tribune, the county has since backed down. This pattern repeats: local officials sense public opposition and attempt to pump the brakes. Developers sue for nine-figure damages. Councils capitulate.
"What I'm seeing is that these communities don't have the financial resources to fight back," Brockovich said. "They're being told: approve this, or face a lawsuit you cannot afford to defend."
But the core issue isn't just about process or political power. It's about water.
According to analysis by the Guardian, two-thirds of planned datacentres in the United States are located in areas already experiencing severe drought. The larger facilities require up to 5 million gallons of water daily for cooling systems—equivalent to the consumption of approximately 50,000 people. In regions where water is already scarce, where agriculture competes with municipalities for supply and where climate patterns are becoming less predictable, this demand is not abstract.
Brockovich's email submissions reveal a community grappling with immediate, measurable impacts. One resident reported their monthly water bill climbing from $22 to more than $350 after a datacentre began operations nearby. Others describe ecological changes: wildlife disappearing, dead animals found, nesting sites for protected species disrupted. The emails carry a tone of displacement—the sense that something fundamental about their landscape is being altered without their consent or even their knowledge.
"People are watching nature because they respect it, they need it," Brockovich said. "And they're watching it being destroyed."
One of the most revealing aspects of her investigation is the opacity surrounding these decisions. If the projects are truly beneficial—if they create jobs, strengthen local economies and operate without environmental consequence—why the secrecy? Why the nondisclosure agreements? Why do residents learn about massive construction projects only when they spot equipment and concrete foundations?
Brockovich is careful not to claim this represents widespread, coordinated corruption. "I don't think local governments are setting out to stonewall residents," she said. Rather, what she's observing is a structural imbalance. Tech companies have vastly more capital and legal firepower than county commissioners and rural townships. When conflicts arise, the asymmetry becomes obvious. A community can organize, petition and protest—and still lose because it cannot absorb the cost of defending a lawsuit.
The precedent matters. In 1993, Brockovich helped prove that a corporation had knowingly poisoned drinking water and then concealed the fact. The case established that documentation, persistence and public disclosure could overcome corporate indifference. Three decades later, she's returning to a familiar question: How much do communities actually know about what's happening on their land?
The difference this time is scale. PG&E contaminated groundwater in one California town. The datacentre infrastructure now spreading across America involves dozens of locations, multiple states and corporate entities with combined valuations in the trillions. If the approval process remains opaque, if environmental assessments are skipped or sealed, if local governments cannot effectively negotiate with opponents who have unlimited litigation resources, then communities face not just one Hinkley but dozens of them, happening simultaneously.
Brockovich's map and her community submissions represent the first comprehensive accounting of where these facilities exist and what people near them are observing. It's a public record created by the public itself, because official records remain locked behind nondisclosure agreements.
"The first step," she said, "is making sure people know what's being built and why. Once that happens, communities can decide for themselves whether the tradeoffs are worth it. But right now, that choice isn't being offered."
