Chicago residents could see their electric bills increase by as much as $70 in the next 3 years.

>> That's according to a study from the Citizens Utility Board.

Researchers say the culprit is the rise of AI data centers straining the electric grid as a result, some local municipalities are putting a moratorium on new data centers.

Meanwhile, ComEd says it recently struck an agreement with several large scale data centers in order to mitigate the surge and utility bills.

Joining us now with more are Max Lightman, director of economic development for comment.

Sarah Moscowitz executive director of the Citizens Utility Board.

Allison Lindbergh, director of sustainability for the city of Aurora and Brad teats director of state policy for the Data Collection Center Data Center Collection.

Thanks to all of you for joining us.

Greta, want to start with you, please.

Because there can often be confusion when we're talking about understanding data centers and what they do and what are the different types.

So what do they do and what are the different types?

Yeah.

So the data center industry and it's been around for decades.

But I think, you know, only been until recently like that.

We've some, you know, renewed attention, but >> the data center industry is powering our 21st Century economy.

So everything we do on the Internet is is powered and process through through a data center.

So when you look at the data center industry, historically, what you've had is what's called Multi-tenant enterprise owner and Enterprise Data Center.

So multi-tenant they're going to build to suit building that provides the the space, the power, the infrastructure for tenants in and the tenants can range from one to 200 tenants.

And you might have banks and hospitals, governments and school storing their data in there.

But then you get to the the enterprise or HYPERSCALE data center and those are going to be the household names that that we all know does.

Amazon, Microsoft and Google's of the world and they'll use their own data centers to to, you know, process and on their own computer in their own data.

You know, so really when you look at where demand for data is going, you know, the average household has 21 connected devices now in when you think about all the phones, you have all the computers you have your your 3rd year sparked thermostat.

part of elevation.

Here I was you know, in the next 5 years, we're going to use twice the amount of data that we've used in the last 10 years.

And I used to work at the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce and every every business now is basically a tech business.

So, you know, the the technology like and like where we are right now is so interwoven into our daily lives.

And we're going of that is the data center.

Yeah, there's a I which is is a whole other level of need as far as data centers go.

But can you tell us about how many data centers are currently active in the state of Illinois?

And it varies different mask are going to have different numbers and how you categorize different data centers as is different.

>> You know, most accounts will show between 150 to 200.

You know, I will make the point that and jail while the site selection from came out last week with a study that showed, you know, 25% of the workload actually occurring in data centers right now as AI.

But about 55% is for cloud-based services and you know, another 30 or so percent is for kind of traditional storage.

So I know all the news about big AI data centers but only a kind of a quarter of what's actually happening in data center, right?

Right.

We've been doing it for a long time.

>> Sarah Moscowitz Cub has studied the impact of data centers on utility costs.

What it find.

Well, we know there's no question that data centers are having an impact on our power prices.

The independent market market monitor that oversees the markets that include northern Illinois, basically said that the biggest reason why our power prices spiked last June was because of forecasted low growth due to data center demand.

So this is already having an impact on our bills.

And I think I understand that data centers are important to our economy, but I think the way that our power sector has been regulated historically has not really equipped for the scale of this energy demand all coming line all at once.

And so we're excited to work with stakeholders in Illinois to try to hammer out some solutions because we need to kind of tackle this from every angle possible.

things that we can do at the state level things we can do at the regional wholesale market level federal level.

It's really an unprecedented challenge, especially after a couple of decades of really flat demand for electricity and I think You know, it's a real opportunity to to kind of work out some technological and some policy solutions to this issue.

That's already affecting consumers.

You mentioned something called forecasted loan growth, which I want to come back to in a little bit little bit later Max, if you would explain to our how energy pricing works and what's comments rolling Yes, that's a great question.

So on every but every individual's electrical bill from ComEd, they're 3 different components.

Theirs.

>> Distribution, which is the cost getting power to homes and businesses there transmission, which is the cost of delivering power over long distances.

And then there's energy supplier generation comment is a is what we call wires, only utility.

So we only own.

>> The distribution lines that that take the power to to the to the mirror and the transmission lines that moving over long distances.

And so we don't have generation assets.

And and so we don't we don't have any control or influence over that portion of the bill.

But we are seeing really significant expressions of interest in terms of applications for for power, from large data centers and so are large customers, which include data centers.

And they include, you know, advanced manufacturing in a range of other.

Customers.

So is the scale for for point of reference within the last 3 or so years we've seen applications for service that total over 30,000 megawatts of power.

your comment is roughly 120 years old has utility and our all-time system peak is about just shy of 24,000 megawatts.

And so what we've seen over the last 3 years projects, if all of those projects are real and they all get built and they all meet their maximum usage.

We project to see demand that that doubles what it took a 120 years, roughly 2 to achieve.

And as you're saying that as you're saying, 30,000 megawatts of, see all of you nodding your heads and understanding that that is that is a significant amount power is to get And I think Sarah mentioned that there's a need to modernize.

>> lot of aspects around how we are addressing the challenge of of of the growth of demand, which also includes things like like Kaisha, none.

You know, people putting solar on their roofs yeah.

We made comment at both the state level with the Illinois Commerce Commission and the federal level at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission or FERC, which try adapt to these changing types of projects and ensure that all the costs are properly born by the customers who who are receiving that service and that we don't see shifting of costs from one group of customers to OK, I want to come back to that in a second as well.

But I want to bring Allison in here as well because >> Aurora implemented a six-month moratorium on data center development.

White will do that.

What are the concerns?

Yeah, we had a couple of different concerns about that.

So currently has 4 data centers and we have 5 that are in development.

>> But we had received many different request for a new development for data centers.

And at the same time, some of our existing data centers.

We were getting some complaints from residents related to noise related to vibration.

then we had some environmental concerns related to water consumption.

And that would be for new data centers.

And then we obviously had some concerns also about hearing that data centers were causing increased electricity bills as well.

At the same time, Aurora actually treated data centers like warehouses.

So every building used type has certain kinds of regulations.

But we didn't have a definition for data centers and also for a municipality.

We didn't have a way to put any kind of requirements are guardrails on data centers.

We didn't even have a definition.

So in order for our staff to take a look and look at some best practices and see what others were doing to basically deal with high demand for development.

We put a six-month moratorium in place on both data centers and warehouses.

So imagine a data center would function very differently and consume energy very differently from a warehouse.

Yes, absolutely.

Max.

A comment is made these transmissions security agreements with some of the largest data centers in Illinois.

One of those agreements to for consumers ending.

So last week we announced that we had reached agreements with 8 large customers, all for more data centers.

And these are essentially long-term contracts with these customers for the transmission portion.

>> Of their bill.

And so what we're seeking to do is provide a revenue guarantee.

So that it has we defer any customer, any project that we build?

They give us a projection of demand and from that were able to calculate what they would pay in rates.

>> And if the project meets the the energy usage that they project, then comic collect that revenue and rates and we use that money to build and maintain the But if any individual project fall short of that projection, then there's a shortfall.

But the cost of building and maintaining the system remains the same.

And so essentially what has to happen is that that cost gets spread across other customers.

That shortfall gets cup spread across customers.

And so these long-term agreements with these customers ensure that if for some reason they don't meet the projection of energy usage and there is a shortfall in in 4 in the form of the rates that they would pay that comment.

Customers essentially are insured or they're held harmless because the customer we do provide those funds through rates or they'll provide out those funds the security agreement.

And that's sort of like a the problem with forecast low growth that that you mentioned area earlier.

Sara, tell me if you know some of this action addresses, some of the concerns that come house.

Yeah, I think we're happy to see arrangements like that.

And I'm glad that the utilities taking this kind of >> The issue of kind of speculative Lowden this concerned that we could be building out system for data centers that don't show up or that don't use as much energy as they initially requested.

And like Mac said.

>> That means it in cases like that.

That means the rest of the customer base would be holding the bag.

And so I think stuff like that is what we need to see.

I hope to see action in Springfield that would actually kind of mandate arrangements like that and really ensure that data centers and other large customers have to put their money where their mouth is.

And so that we aren't in the situation where you have a risk of the rest of the utility's customers shouldering costs for infrastructure upgrades that were made for a customer that doesn't show up and then is not going to be paying that off over time.

And I think, you know, that's kind of how our utility system has been developed over over history is essentially that, you know, you will have current customers subsidize the cost to increased its increasing infrastructure with the ad for new customers with this idea that new customers would then help pay, you'd be spreading out more kilowatt hours across more customers.

And so that would actually keep costs down.

But because of the speed with which a data center can come online and it's like some of these hyper scalar can use as much dollars as a city.

>> And so that's the issue here.

And so I think we're going to need ideas like that.

But more of that and then also ideas that can apply to the wholesale market level.

Brad, why what do you think?

It's important that Illinois invest data center infrastructure.

>> Well, and there's a lot to unpack with.

All that's been been said here as well.

you know, I mean, the economic benefits are clear and we're getting updated numbers soon.

But in 2023, you know, data centers at about 20 billion dollars to our GDP.

You know, here in Illinois Yoon about 120,000 jobs have been, you know, in and around the data center ecosystem and importantly, for a state that has a lot of property tax issues, about 2 billion dollars in property, taxes, state and local taxes.

So benefits are clear.

Not not just the underpinning of our, you know that digital economy cause when data centers come, they attract other kinds of technology businesses as well.

But, you know, I think, too, and I want to defer speak to the, you know, as you load forecasting.

And that has been something that our organization has been trying to figure out with PJM because there you know, there is a lot of speculation in the market and it's adding to interconnection application cues over at ComEd.

It's it's kind of painting this foggy picture that it's hard to tell what's real and what's not real.

So, you know, we've been pushing for things that, you know, around verification of commercial readiness for, you know, with at T J M Things around, more transparency about new around the assumptions they're using when they're, you know, trying to develop their large load forecast.

So there's a lot going on there.

But at the end of the day, the industry is committed to paying, you know, it's full calls for service full stop and you know, where this should be dealt with is is through our public utility commissions across the country and the dcc active many of these negotiations trying to figure this out.

It's complicated and trying to parse out these costs as Max will tell you is is very, very tedious process.

But, you know, the the last point I want to make, you know, Illinois, obviously we have seen our climate negligible jobs Act in place which has climate goals.

84% of the renewable procurements done nationally last and the first 6 months of 2025 or done by data centers.

So if there is one industry who's kind of power in a clean energy economy, is this one?

>> we've got about 45 seconds left.

You know what kind of agreements have been made with data centers to address environmental concerns?

There's quite a few that are have been done.

I would say on their own accord, some of the large data centers, they see a benefit from doing things related to sustainability, especially because they might have an agreement with an international company that has climate goals.

But by and large, there's no one size fits all solution for sustainability or environmentalism.

I will say that since we started the moratorium, we have had one data center come to us interested in developing in Aurora that wants to become one of the most sustainable data centers in the region.

All right.

Give us a call.

And that goes down.

Want we want to know how they do it because that's what we're going to have to leave it next.