Making the Case for Meaningful Environmental Review of Data Centers

media release: In July, Midwest Environmental Advocates filed a lawsuit on behalf of the Sierra Club over the DNR’s decision to issue permits for a massive data center campus in Port Washington without fully evaluating the project’s environmental consequences.

The Port Washington data center is one of a growing number of hyperscale data centers planned for Wisconsin. These projects will have major consequences for public health and the environment, yet no Wisconsin data center has ever undergone a comprehensive environmental review. Instead, they have advanced through a fragmented permitting process that evaluates data center proposals one permit and one project at a time.

We invite you to join us on Wednesday, September 30m at 6:30 PM as we take a closer look at the Port Washington lawsuit and the legal and policy issues involved. We’ll explore how environmental review is supposed to work in Wisconsin, why existing processes fail to capture the full impacts of hyperscale data centers, and how legal action and public participation can strengthen environmental oversight.

 MEA attorney Michael Greif will be joined by Elizabeth Ward, Director of Sierra Club – Wisconsin Chapter, and Christine Le Jeune of Great Lakes Neighbors United.