Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania Community Groups Urge Officials to Restrict Data Center Development – Inside Climate News
As plans to build huge data centers multiply across the United States, some Pennsylvania communities are pushing back.
Responding to public opposition, commissioners in Hampden Township, near Harrisburg, voted in September against allowing data centers in office park zones.
In the borough of Blakely, northeast of Scranton, a developer dropped plans for a data center that same month after local protests.
And in Anthony Township in central Pennsylvania, a citizens group is urging municipal leaders to reject an application by Talen Energy, a power-generating company, to rezone 1,300 acres near one of its power plants to an industrial classification that could be used for a data center.
“To pick up that much land and build any kind of industry would be very detrimental to the whole rural atmosphere,” said Sam Burleigh, a co-founder of the group, Concerned Citizens of Montour County.
Taryne Williams, a spokesperson for Talen Energy, said a change to industrial zoning would align with the classification of other Talen-owned land in the area.
“We are still assessing the viability of potential projects, and the rezoning request will help support any possible future development opportunity near the plant, which could include data centers,” Williams said.
Data centers power the internet, but what’s driving the new increase in proposals around the country—many of them supersized—is artificial intelligence. Boosters say these complexes are big taxpayers and bring jobs. Critics often cite the intense buildout in Northern Virginia as an illustration of the effect they can have on communities, from constant low-frequency noise to spiking electric bills and major water usage.
Data-center developers warned the Virginia utility Dominion Energy at the end of last year that their upcoming projects would need 40 gigawatts of electricity—the energy equivalent of increasing Virginia’s households nearly fourfold.
Dominion plans to respond by building more natural gas power plants, which could raise utility bills for households and businesses while increasing carbon emissions.
Many data centers also have on-site diesel generators that are meant for backup power but are being run more frequently, worsening air quality and prompting noise complaints from residents.
“We’ve seen the devastating impact of these hyper-scale data centers in other states. We applaud Hampden Township for standing up against this water and energy guzzling industry,” said Virginia Marcille-Kerslake, eastern Pennsylvania organizer for the nonprofit Food & Water Watch, which took credit for mobilizing public opposition to the proposed zoning change there.
Some 300 Hampden residents signed a petition opposing the zoning change. The town’s seven commissioners voted unanimously against it.
“When we caught wind that Hampden was doing this, we created a flyer with a QR code to raise awareness,” Marcille-Kerslake said. “We started knocking on doors, and nobody knew about it but as word started to spread, the comments people made were so well-informed.”
Marcille-Kerslake urged municipalities to restrict data centers to industrial zones and away from homes, schools and hospitals. Food & Water Watch recommends imposing conditions on data centers rather than banning them altogether.
“You have to put it somewhere, so you have to have a very strong ordinance to keep the data center in the industrial district,” she said.
Twenty-one data centers are now planned in Pennsylvania, according to padatacenterproposals.com, a database that tracks the projects. Many are in the northeastern part of the state.
Among the projects moving forward is one planned by Amazon Web Services in Salem Township, near Wilkes-Barre. The project, one of two Amazon data centers that represent a total investment of $20 billion by the tech giant in Pennsylvania, is expected to use about as much electricity as 750,000 homes.
Not far from there, in Hazle Township, NorthPoint Development is planning a 15-building data center on some 1,280 acres.
And in neighboring Delaware, recently unveiled plans to build a six-million-square-foot data center in the northern part of the state have prompted a bill in New Castle County calling on the developer to ensure that the electric grid will have sufficient capacity to supply the 1,200 megawatts that the giant center would need. Delaware is part of the regional grid run by PJM Interconnection, which also includes Pennsylvania and Virginia, and it’s already under pressure from data-center growth.
The latest version of the New Castle County bill also calls for the developer to plan for the center’s decommissioning so taxpayers are not left with the cost of closing it down.
Developer Starwood Digital Ventures said about 40 percent of the site would be open space, about twice the share required by the county, and around double that typically occupied by data centers around the country.
The company plans to meet the plant’s huge energy needs by connecting to an existing 500-kilovolt power line that is “one of the largest capacity lines that is employed on the U.S. grid,” said Starwood’s CEO, Anthony Balastrieri. “Having access to that infrastructure that already exists is very beneficial.”
About This Story
Perhaps you noticed: This story, like all the news we publish, is free to read. That’s because Inside Climate News is a 501c3 nonprofit organization. We do not charge a subscription fee, lock our news behind a paywall, or clutter our website with ads. We make our news on climate and the environment freely available to you and anyone who wants it.
That’s not all. We also share our news for free with scores of other media organizations around the country. Many of them can’t afford to do environmental journalism of their own. We’ve built bureaus from coast to coast to report local stories, collaborate with local newsrooms and co-publish articles so that this vital work is shared as widely as possible.
Two of us launched ICN in 2007. Six years later we earned a Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting, and now we run the oldest and largest dedicated climate newsroom in the nation. We tell the story in all its complexity. We hold polluters accountable. We expose environmental injustice. We debunk misinformation. We scrutinize solutions and inspire action.
Donations from readers like you fund every aspect of what we do. If you don’t already, will you support our ongoing work, our reporting on the biggest crisis facing our planet, and help us reach even more readers in more places?
Please take a moment to make a tax-deductible donation. Every one of them makes a difference.
Thank you,
Here’s what we know now about school cellphone bans
More states are implementing or considering phone bans in schools following guidance from the U.S. Surgeon General on children and social media.
If Pennsylvania sees statewide restrictions on cellphones in schools, would anything change in Pittsburgh?
It’s too early to say for sure.
On June 1, the Pennsylvania House of Representatives passed legislation that would require school districts to adopt phone restrictions, leaving the details of the exact policy’s implementation up to individual districts, according to USA TODAY. Now, if cleared by the Senate — which already passed another version of the proposal with almost unanimous support — it will go to Gov. Josh Shapiro, who has repeatedly said he supports getting cellphones out of classrooms with a bell-to-bell ban.
“Here in Pennsylvania, Democrats and Republicans agree: We need to let our kids be kids again,” Shapiro said in a June 4 post to his X account.
But Pittsburgh’s already ahead of the curve when it comes to banning cellphones during school hours because of a school board policy approved in late 2025.
Here’s what to know.
Are cell phones banned in Pittsburgh schools?
Yes, cellphones are banned during the school day at Pittsburgh Public Schools.
In December 2025, Pittsburgh Public Schools Board voted to ban the use of phones by students during the school day, Pittsburgh’s Action News 4.
Under the policy, the possession of phones by students is prohibited. While they may bring cellphones to school, the devices must be turned in to school personnel during the school day.
There are exceptions to the policy in cases where a student may need a phone for instructional activities, an Individualized Education Plan, a Section 504 Plan or for other reasons approved by a school administrator.
Why are schools banning cellphones?
Numerous states have already banned cellphones in schools, including Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New York, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia and others, according to ABC News.
This year, Indiana and Kansas banned phones during the day, implementing policies that require students to keep their phones in inaccessible locations through the entire school day, USA TODAY reported.
Recently, Delaware, Georgia, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Oklahoma, Utah, Virginia and Wyoming passed or updated less restrictive legislation on phones in schools, according to an analysis by the Becca Schmill Foundation, the Institute for Families and Technology, Smartphone-Free Childhood US and Jonathan Haidt’s The Anxious Generation.
Illinois, Massachusetts and Pennsylvania may follow suit.
Do cellphone bans work?
Yes and no.
Cellphone bans keep kids off their devices, but they don’t appear to impact test scores, attendance, self-reported classroom attention or perceived online bullying, according to a study published in April by the National Bureau of Economic Research. Additionally, researchers found that during the first year of a cellphone ban, disciplinary incidents rose and students’ reported well-being fell, though the effects subsided as the years passed.
Still, there’s a push for bans nationally, with the U.S. surgeon general’s office warning on May 20 that “compulsive” screen use is linked to poor sleep, substance abuse, developmental disruptions and social, mental and behavioral issues. The office suggested that cellphone bans in schools are a way to help put excessive screen time in check.
Finch Walker is the Pittsburgh Connect Reporter for the USA TODAY Network. Contact Walker at FWalker@usatodayco.com. Instagram: @finchwalker_. X: @_finchwalker.
In an era of pricey theme parks and gated admission, one Pennsylvania amusement park is still letting guests in for free.
Knoebels Amusement Resort in Elysburg, Pennsylvania, has been admission-free since it opened nearly a century ago.
Knoebels opened its doors on July 4, 1926 — and will celebrate its 100th anniversary this year, as the nation celebrates America’s semiquincentennial.
Many of the earliest amusement parks in the late 19th and early 20th centuries operated without admission fees, especially so-called “trolley parks,” which made money from charging guests for rides, food and drink.
Park owner Brian Knoebel, 52, recently told PA Local he “had to pinky-swear” to never change the free-admission model.
“It’s who we are,” he said. “It’s that traditional park.”
Knoebel said he recognizes that grandparents “get more satisfaction out of watching their grandkids ride the rides than they do themselves.”
“And Grandma and Grandpa are on a limited income,” he said. “So they don’t pay to park. We don’t force you to buy food in the park — if you want to bring a picnic lunch, then bring a picnic lunch.”
Knoebel, who said his ancestors came to America from Germany and worked as lumberers, said the amusement park began as a modest venture.
“After church on Sunday, they’d come down and park their horse and buggy off to the side, and frolic in the stream and have a little picnic,” he told PA Local.
“My great-grandfather would feed and stable your horses for, I believe, a quarter.”
Knoebel added, “Little by little, he started building some picnic tables and park benches, and on July 4, 1926, we opened a swimming pool, a restaurant — appropriately named ‘The Restaurant’ — and we rented a steam-powered carousel.”
Despite the park’s growth, Knoebel said its old-fashioned atmosphere has remained intact, including the canopy of trees, shaded walkways, creekside seating and classic attractions.
“How has it changed? We started with one ride, and one food stand, and the pool,” he said.
“We now have 60 rides, I believe 38 food stands, 24 games, and water slides … Quarter-mile down the road, we own the 18-hole golf course, complete with a bar and tavern.”
Overall, Knoebel said that he and his family “absolutely know our brand.”
“We know our fans,” he said.
“And that throwback amusement park from yesteryear is exactly who we continue to be,” he added.
“We don’t have roller coasters that reach the clouds. We have rides for thrill seekers … but, of course, we have more traditional rides.”
Knoebels is the largest free-admission park in the United States. “Knoebels does not have a gate, and you only pay for what you want once you are at the park,” the venue says on its website.
PENNSYLVANIA (WJAC) — Pennsylvania hunters can soon start planning for the upcoming season.
The Pennsylvania Game Commission says 2026-27 general hunting and trapping licenses will go on sale Monday, June 22nd.
The licenses will be valid from July 1st through June 30th of next year.
Hunters can purchase licenses online or at authorized license issuing agents across the state.
The Game Commission is encouraging hunters to verify their account and mailing information before purchasing — to avoid delays.
Antlerless deer licenses also will be available through the state’s licensing system.
-
Los Angeles, Ca1 hour agoMan wanted for deadly Los Angeles road rage shooting extradited from Mexico
-
Detroit, MI2 hours ago‘I could have died’: 14-year-old speaks out after surviving shooting during ‘teen takeover’ in Detroit
-
San Francisco, CA2 hours agoDriver Who Raped Woman After She Mistook His Car For An Uber Convicted By Bay Area Jury
-
Dallas, TX2 hours agoHouse fire on Dallas Court in Rockford leaves more than $100K in damage
-
Miami, FL2 hours agoWildlife officers investigate raccoon attack in North Miami
-
Boston, MA2 hours agoBoston Pride for the People Parade is set to step off, with history, protest in mind
-
Denver, CO2 hours agoHow a Christian Braun Trade to the Mavericks Could Help Nuggets
-
Seattle, WA2 hours agoSeattle Hotel Workers Are on the Verge of Striking Ahead of the World Cup – The Stranger
