Matt Garman, CEO of Amazon Web Services, announced that the company had stopped using non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) with the government agencies it works with to obtain the approvals required to build new data centers. The statement came in a longer post in which Garman defended the role of data centers in communities, at a time when these projects are facing growing opposition across the United States.
Non-disclosure agreements are one of the most prominent points of contention. Environmental activist Erin Brockovich said that the most frequent complaint she hears about data centers concerns transparency, pointing to cases in which projects were announced after permits had been obtained, their developers failed to respond to residents’ inquiries, or local officials signed non-disclosure agreements before informing communities about the projects.
Amid this debate, New York State announced a one-year temporary pause on permits for large data centers. According to Garman, more than 100 similar pauses are being considered across the United States, warning that adopting these measures could weaken the country’s ability to compete and leave effects that extend for generations.
Conflicting Figures on the Environmental Impact
Garman sought to address four main concerns: water consumption, rising electricity prices, pollution, and the absence of local benefits. Citing a report from Amazon, he said that direct water consumption by data centers accounts for only 0.5% of total industrial water use in the United States, far less than sectors such as golf courses and almond farming.
But this comparison does not settle the full water impact. The source notes that Amazon’s calculations, like Nvidia’s statements that its new cooling systems nearly eliminate water use inside data centers, may not include water associated with electricity generation and chip manufacturing. There are also no uniform federal or state requirements imposing a single method on technology companies for reporting water and energy consumption, making independent comparisons between projects more difficult.
Regarding electricity prices, Garman said they had risen in some states with large numbers of data centers, while declining or growing more slowly in others. He attributed increases, when they occur, mainly to the age of electricity grids and the failure to expand them before the arrival of new demand. By contrast, an independent oversight body said that data centers were the main reason behind a 76% year-over-year increase in prices on the largest electricity grid in the United States.
Emissions and Community Promises
Garman also defended data center generators, saying they operate only rarely and remain idle 99.9% of the time, running for about 10 hours annually, usually for mandatory maintenance tests. But the concerns are not limited to normal operations; an Amazon data center proposed in Texas has a permit allowing it to emit 33 million tons of carbon dioxide annually, a figure exceeding what is permitted for any other power plant in the United States, according to the article.
Amazon says it has provided more than $1 billion over the past three years to American communities where it has a significant data center presence. However, the amount spent alone does not answer the question of transparency or explain how local benefits and harms are measured.
Why Does This News Matter?
The announced step changes Amazon’s policy for dealing with government agencies, but it does not by itself prove that its projects have become more transparent or that their environmental and economic impacts have declined. The fundamental problem reflected in the debate is a trust gap: companies provide figures on consumption and operations, while residents and researchers are calling for standardized, verifiable data covering the full impact cycle, from chip manufacturing and electricity generation to center operations. The open question therefore remains whether ending non-disclosure agreements will be accompanied by practical disclosures sufficient to review these claims, particularly as new restrictions on data centers in the United States continue to be considered.