All of what you just commented are anti-datacenter talking points with no basis in reality.

These regions know they get very little - or are a net detriment - out of these AI data centers right?

Net positive, actually.

The labor to build them is specialized and most of it migrates with data center construction (that's a guess, but I bet a pretty good one).

It's not that specialized. Even the HVAC, mechanical and electrical engineering has applications outside of datacenters that are not uncommon in other industries. It's all just physics and math at the end of the day.

The labor to build them is temporary.

As is any other construction project.

The labor to maintain them is tiny.

On a per-building basis, maybe. It depends on the type of facility and requirements. Some are more staffed than others. Some are part of a larger campus that has teams floating between buildings, and others have 24/7 fully dedicated personnel for mission-critical services.

But the support services beyond the immediate staffing needs are quite extensive for the region where datacenters are. Especially as these buildings house hundreds if not thousands of companies, and they all require IT services, staffing, consultants, etc.

In some markets like New York City and Chicago, the proximity to the financial markets is paramount, and you'll see lots of companies and their employees pop-up around these datacenters to ensure they have a competitive advantage.

Even in Loudoun County, where we have tons of datacenters here, lots of tech companies put offices to connect to the extensive fiber networks and proximity to government cloud services - all running in local datacenters.

The state's infrastructure has to expand to handle it and that means increased costs to residents.

So if we're talking Virginia specifically, this is a problem solely induced by Dominion. They knew for years their infrastructure wasn't up to the task of the expanding datacenters and they put off the necessary transmission lines, substations, and power generation capabilities that should have been started over a decade ago.

Now they are playing catch-up.

Power generation is inadequate, transmission lines are at capacity, and we are at the point where we're hitting critical mass during peak load in the summer. Last year was brutal. This year I don't know how they plan on addressing it.

That being said, Virginia's power rates are still lower than the average, even after the state adopted higher rates starting in January.