Trump is giving data centers a pass to pollute
Trump is giving data centers a pass to pollute
特朗普政府为数据中心大开“污染绿灯”
President Donald Trump is weakening environmental regulations in the name of speeding up the construction of AI data centers, raising health risks for Americans, a cadre of former EPA officials said this week in a briefing and new report. They are urging — perhaps futilely — the president to adopt a “Data Center Health Protection Pledge” to signal that the administration is taking the environmental threat seriously.
唐纳德·特朗普总统正以加速建设人工智能（AI）数据中心为名，削弱环境监管力度，从而增加了美国民众的健康风险。本周，一批前美国环保署（EPA）官员在简报会和一份新报告中指出，他们正敦促总统采纳一项“数据中心健康保护承诺”，以表明政府正在认真对待这一环境威胁——尽管这种努力可能徒劳无功。
At the start of his term, Trump’s EPA administrator, Lee Zeldin, proclaimed his goal of making America “the AI capital of the world” through deregulation. Since then, Zeldin and the White House have rolled back dozens of rules on top of cutting staff and funding at the US EPA.
在任期之初，特朗普任命的环保署署长李·泽尔丁（Lee Zeldin）宣称，他的目标是通过放松监管，使美国成为“世界AI之都”。自那时起，泽尔丁与白宫不仅削减了美国环保署的人员和资金，还撤销了数十项法规。
As a result of the Trump administration’s deregulation spree and attacks on renewable energy, the wave of new AI data centers is increasingly powered by dirty energy that can impact Americans’ health even if they don’t live near a data center, the group of EPA alumni warn. They say that the agency they once worked for, which was created to “protect human health and the environment,” is no longer the watchdog it should be as the physical infrastructure underpinning generative AI changes America’s landscape.
这群前环保署官员警告称，由于特朗普政府的放松监管狂潮以及对可再生能源的打压，新一波AI数据中心正越来越多地依赖污染性能源供电。即便民众并未居住在数据中心附近，这些能源带来的污染仍可能影响他们的健康。他们表示，随着支撑生成式AI的物理基础设施改变着美国的版图，他们曾经效力的那个旨在“保护人类健康与环境”的机构，已不再是它本应成为的监管者。
“You would think that an industry buildout of this magnitude, billed as a revolution, would mean more vigilance from EPA,” Lynn Goldman, a pediatrician and a former EPA assistant administrator, said at the briefing. “Instead, EPA is doing just the opposite, thinking first about industry’s needs and weakening or reconsidering limits on toxic chemicals and harmful pollutants.”
“你本以为如此大规模、被标榜为一场革命的行业建设，会促使环保署保持更高的警惕，”儿科医生、前环保署助理署长琳恩·戈德曼（Lynn Goldman）在简报会上说道，“然而，环保署的做法恰恰相反，他们首先考虑的是行业需求，并削弱或重新审视了对有毒化学品和有害污染物的限制。”
Goldman and other former EPA employees who are part of an independent organization called the Environmental Protection Network released a report this week that identifies 30 different federal actions since January 2025 that they say exacerbate health risks stemming from data center pollution.
戈德曼和其他来自独立组织“环境保护网络”（Environmental Protection Network）的前环保署员工本周发布了一份报告，指出了自2025年1月以来联邦政府采取的30项不同行动，他们认为这些行动加剧了数据中心污染带来的健康风险。
That includes executive actions and proposals meant to curtail renewable energy projects while softening pollution regulations and exempting existing power plants and factories from certain standards. Of the 30 policy changes included in the report, 17 specifically mention AI or target data centers.
其中包括旨在削减可再生能源项目、同时放宽污染法规并豁免现有发电厂和工厂某些标准的行政命令与提案。在报告列出的30项政策变动中，有17项明确提到了AI或针对数据中心。
Trump released an “AI Action Plan” in July 2025, recommending “streamlining or reducing regulations” under the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, and Superfund law to expedite permitting for data center projects and chip factories. “What the AI plan is really about [is] using unprecedented emergency powers to grant massive new exemptions for data centers and specifically fossil fuel infrastructure,” Tyson Slocum, energy program director at the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen, told The Verge at the time.
特朗普于2025年7月发布了一份“AI行动计划”，建议根据《清洁空气法》、《清洁水法》和《超级基金法》“精简或减少监管”，以加快数据中心项目和芯片工厂的审批速度。消费者权益保护组织“公共公民”（Public Citizen）的能源项目主任泰森·斯洛库姆（Tyson Slocum）当时告诉《The Verge》：“这份AI计划的真正意图，是利用前所未有的紧急权力，为数据中心，特别是化石燃料基础设施，提供大规模的新豁免。”
Trump has essentially laid the policy groundwork for new gas projects to power energy-hungry data centers, ranging from turbines installed on-site to power plants built specifically to serve tech companies. Meanwhile, demand for advanced chips needed for generative AI is reviving the production of forever chemicals that don’t break down easily and build up in the environment and human bodies. All this new infrastructure can spread pollution far from the data centers they support.
特朗普实际上已为新的天然气项目铺平了政策道路，以满足能源需求巨大的数据中心，从现场安装的涡轮机到专门为科技公司服务的发电厂。与此同时，生成式AI所需的先进芯片需求，正在复苏那些难以分解、且会在环境和人体内积聚的“永久性化学物质”的生产。所有这些新基础设施都可能将污染扩散到远离数据中心的地方。
“You do not need to be near a data center to be affected, because the pollution doesn’t just come from the data centers themselves,” Goldman says. “A more polluting AI buildout is not inevitable. It depends on the choices government makes now.”
“你不需要靠近数据中心也会受到影响，因为污染不仅仅来自数据中心本身，”戈德曼说，“一个污染更严重的AI建设并非不可避免。这取决于政府现在做出的选择。”
The new report cites a study from UC Riverside, Caltech, and the Rochester Institute of Technology that found that air pollution associated with AI could lead to up to 1,300 premature deaths and more than $20 billion in public health costs by 2028. The toll could be even larger after factoring in the policy changes outlined in EPN’s report, according to the organization. The US can avoid those losses by restoring clean air and water standards, as well as rebuilding federal agencies’ capacity to enforce those rules, the EPA alumni argue.
这份新报告引用了加州大学河滨分校、加州理工学院和罗切斯特理工学院的一项研究，该研究发现，到2028年，与AI相关的空气污染可能导致多达1300人过早死亡，并造成超过200亿美元的公共卫生损失。该组织表示，在计入EPN报告中概述的政策变动后，这一代价可能会更大。这些前环保署官员认为，美国可以通过恢复清洁空气和水标准，以及重建联邦机构执行这些规则的能力来避免这些损失。
“A more polluting AI buildout is not inevitable. It depends on the choices government makes now,” Marc Boom, EPN’s senior director of public affairs, said in the briefing. “EPA should be measuring how this buildout is changing pollution, who is being exposed, what it means for their health, and making all of that information public. That is what a Data Center Health Protection Pledge should mean in practice.”
“一个污染更严重的AI建设并非不可避免。这取决于政府现在做出的选择，”EPN公共事务高级总监马克·布姆（Marc Boom）在简报会上说，“环保署应该评估这种建设如何改变污染状况、谁受到了影响、这对他们的健康意味着什么，并将所有这些信息公开。这才是‘数据中心健康保护承诺’在实践中应有的意义。”
Responding to the report in an email to The Verge, EPA spokesperson Cora Mandy said, “In each action EPA has taken, the agency has returned regulations to the best reading [of] the Clean Air Act after years of被 previous administrations.” She also reiterated the agency’s commitment to “Protect Human Health and The Environment” while simultaneously prioritizing “Making America the AI Capital of the World.”
环保署发言人科拉·曼迪（Cora Mandy）在回复《The Verge》的电子邮件中回应称：“在环保署采取的每一项行动中，该机构都在前几届政府多年过度干预后，将法规恢复到了对《清洁空气法》的最佳解读。”她还重申了该机构在优先考虑“使美国成为世界AI之都”的同时，致力于“保护人类健康与环境”的承诺。