The data center fight in Hawaii County, Hawaii
As of September 27, 2026, Hawaii County, Hawaii has a tracked data center action (action taken Jul 8, 2026).
Status is derived, not stored — a pause with a documented end date flips to Expired on its own — and the source is right next to the claim.
Status today
Bill 170 (Councilmember Heather Kimball) amends county zoning code to declare industrial-scale data centers 'not a permitted use in the County.' Policy Committee voted 8-0 to forward to planning commissions. Windward Planning Commission voted 4-0 to defer (Sep 3). Leeward Commission meets Oct 15. Both must recommend by Nov 4 or it defaults to negative. Planning Director prefers size limits (10,000 sq ft cap) over total ban. Over 40 testimonies, mostly supportive.
SourceNews
read 2026-09-12
An expiry date is the earliest a pause could have ended — extensions are common, so confirm with the clerk before citing it.
What to do next
- Questions to ask at the hearing — force specific answers onto the record.
- Estimate the impact — electricity, water, and rate pressure for any facility size in Hawaii.
- Model CBA clauses — copy-paste language communities have actually won.
- Hawaii briefing — rates, grid carbon, PUC contacts, and every fight in the state.
As of August 2026 · changes weekly — re-check before citing
Illustrative rather than exhaustive — dozens of localities churn weekly, and this tracks the ones we have read a source for. **Each row carries its own provenance.** Rows showing a verification date link to the ordinance, the enacting body's own page, or a datable report of the vote, and were read on that date. Rows marked *unverified* came from bulk compilation and have not been checked against a primary source — the locality, the year, and the status may all be off. Verify one of those with the town clerk before citing it as precedent. **Expiry is derived, not asserted.** A row with a documented end date flips to *Expired* on its own once that date passes. A time-limited moratorium whose start date was never documented keeps showing as enacted — that is a known gap, not a claim that it is still in force. Moratoriums are also routinely extended, so an expiry date is the earliest it could have ended, not proof that it did.
Part of the U.S. data center moratorium tracker — open data, CC BY 4.0.