Abbott slaps halt on Texas data center permits - Politico

The move expands what was already a de facto moratorium on new data center projects in the state. Abbott had already blocked the massive server farms from connecting to Texas' main power grid, and now he's cutting off their other path to breaking ground, the environmental permitting process. Any data center hoping to build in Texas now has to wait on both fronts.

Abbott framed the pause as a matter of priorities. "Simply put, Texans must come first," he said Monday, adding that data centers must pay their own way and protect the grid.

For Lubbock and the rest of West Texas, this lands in the middle of an ongoing fight over who pays for the power these facilities need. Data centers draw enormous amounts of electricity. Texas has scrambled for years to keep up with demand from tech companies racing to build server farms across the state, and Abbott's order signals he wants answers on grid capacity before more of them get greenlit.

The audit's timeline isn't clear yet, so the freeze could last weeks or months. Every data center project waiting on a Texas permit right now is stuck in limbo until Austin decides the grid can handle it.