Amazon Employees Show Up to City Council Meetings to Demand Limits on Data Centers

Key points

• Three Amazon employees on Wednesday publicly called for regulations on new data centers, telling elected officials in Seattle that unchecked development of the sharply disputed nerve centers of AI threatens the region’s environment, economy, and safety.
• “Local governments, in collaboration with community stakeholders, should be setting the terms for data center buildout,” Amazon senior software engineer Liesl Wigand said at a city hearing.
• “Let’s not let Big Tech burn Seattle to win the AI race.” The comments by Wigand and two other Amazon software engineers mark a significant escalation in the protest movement across the US against the rapid construction of data centers over the past couple of years.
• While workers at several big tech companies, including Amazon, have complained about the negative effects of data centers and the need for greater oversight, none are believed to have done so as publicly and explicitly before, according to labor organizers supporting...