Pennsylvania's House Voted 202-1 to Deny Data Centers Utility Status

The Pennsylvania House voted 202 to 1 on Monday, October 19, to prohibit commercial data centers from being designated public utilities. House Bill 2674, sponsored by Rep. Chris Pielli, a Chester County Democrat, now moves to the state Senate. A companion measure, Senate Bill 1385 from Sen. Katie Muth, has drawn no action there.

Public-utility status in Pennsylvania carries legal powers, not just a label. Utilities can ask the Public Utility Commission for approval to take, occupy and condemn property, and the designation brings rights-of-way and the regulated treatment that goes with serving the public. HB 2674 defines what a commercial data center is and places it outside that category. Supporters of the bill argue the designation would otherwise let developers preempt municipal zoning ordinances and operate as regulated monopolies. Pielli put the state inventory at as many as 130 active data centers, with another 55 proposed, planned or under construction. No Pennsylvania developer has sought the designation. The bill is written against the possibility rather than a pending filing.

Siting determines where electrical scope lands and when it starts. A developer holding condemnation authority can route a line, assemble a parcel and place a substation pad largely on its own schedule. A developer without it has to buy the land, negotiate easements and clear local zoning, which means conditional-use hearings, municipal plan review and the local inspection authority that signs off on the finished work. Campus phasing follows the land. Feeder routing, switchgear rooms and medium-voltage distribution get laid out after a site is secured, not before.

For contractors staffing Pennsylvania work inside the PJM footprint, the consequence falls on schedule rather than scope. The electrical package on a hyperscale campus does not get smaller because the owner negotiated for the land instead of condemning it. It starts later, and often in a different sequence. Crews are hired against notices to proceed, so a prolonged land assembly moves the hiring window rather than the headcount, and it concentrates work in the municipalities that approve projects fastest. Contractors bidding that work carry the delay risk in their schedules rather than their crew counts.

The bill's near-term prospects are narrow. Pennsylvania requires a measure to be considered on three separate days in each chamber, and the Senate's last expected voting day on substantive bills this session fell on Wednesday, October 21. Pielli, who introduced the bill in late June, has said he intends to reintroduce it next session. If the measure does not clear the chamber, it dies with the session. Rep. Mark Gillen, a Berks County Republican, called the prospect of data centers holding condemnation authority a red flag during debate.

The margin is the part worth tracking. A 202-to-1 vote on who controls data center siting tells Pennsylvania electrical contractors which direction the land-use rules are moving, whatever becomes of this particular bill.