Whitehouse, Kelly Press EPA, AI Companies on Rollback of Public Input Rules for Data Center Air Permits

Washington, DC - U.S. Senators Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Ranking Member of the Senate Environment and Public Works (EPW) Committee, and Mark Kelly (D-AZ) sent two letters last week opposing the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) proposal to eliminate the 30-day mandatory public notice period that allows communities to provide input on proposed facilities, like data centers, that may affect the air they breathe.

The first letter urges EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin to withdraw the proposed rule and disclose any documents showing that the agency communicated with data center owners ahead of the proposal.

"We agree that permitting should be efficient, predictable, and capable of supporting the infrastructure our country needs. But faster permitting should not come at the expense of transparency or communities' ability to shape the decisions that affect them," wrote the senators to Administrator Zeldin.

The second letter calls on nine major data center companies - Anthropic, AWS, Fermi, Google, Joule, Meta, Microsoft, OpenAI, and xAI - to commit to maintaining current public participation standards regardless of the rule's outcome. The senators asked the companies to explain their own policies governing community engagement before constructing data centers and disclose any documents showing that the companies communicated with EPA, the White House, or other federal agencies ahead of the proposal.

"Data center companies like yours…have a responsibility not to use weaker requirements to limit…communities' ability to meaningfully shape decisions that affect them," wrote the senators to the data center companies. "America can build the infrastructure needed to compete and innovate while keeping communities informed and involved in the decisions that affect them."

The senators requested both parties provide relevant documents and answers to their questions by October 23, 2026.

In addition to Whitehouse and Kelly, the letter to the EPA was co-signed by Senators Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), Ron Wyden (D-OR), Tammy Duckworth (D-IL), Michael Bennet (D-CO), Ruben Gallego (D-AZ), Edward Markey (D-MA), and Adam Schiff (D-CA).

In addition to Whitehouse and Kelly, the letter to the data companies was co-signed by Senators Ron Wyden (D-OR), Martin Heinrich (D-NM), Tammy Duckworth (D-IL), Ruben Gallego (D-AZ), and Adam Schiff (D-CA).

Read the full letter to the EPA here.

Read the full letter to the AI companies here.