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* House Speaker Welch talked about data center regulation last night…
At a Tuesday forum hosted by state Rep. Amy “Murri” Briel, Illinois House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch, a Cook County Democrat, said lawmakers will tackle this very issue during the upcoming fall veto session. […]
Welch said the Illinois General Assembly is “very likely” to address the regulation of data centers as part of an energy bill. Lawmakers, he said, want to seize the potentially lucrative jobs but also want the companies to be good stewards of the earth.
“We certainly want Illinois to be front and center and take advantage of this boom from a jobs perspective,” Welch said, “but we want to make sure we don’t hurt our environment.”
“We think we’re close,” he said. “We think we’re going to be able to get something done.”
The rest of the quote…
We want to be able to take advantage of this from a jobs perspective, but we also want to be responsible about it. And want to make sure we don’t hurt our environment.
And that’s why all of these groups are at the table. That’s why we didn’t pass something in May, similar in ‘21. We’ve been working on this all summer.
My team’s telling me we think we’re going to be able to get something done in the upcoming veto session, that all the parties agree on labor, environmentalists.
There was a time in Springfield where, you know, environmentalists weren’t even at the table, right? They just weren’t even heard. Under my leadership style, all of these folks are at the table. Might take us a little longer to get things done, but I would rather take our time and get it right. Make sure the policy is right for rural Illinois, rather than rushing it wrong. These jobs are going to go somewhere. If they’re not in Illinois, they’re going to go to Iowa, they’re going to go to Indiana. So let’s make sure we work with the business communities. Get their input. Let’s work with the utility companies. Let’s get environment on this, labor, work with everyone.
The problem with these big bills is that can get too big and then fall over, like an over-decorated Christmas tree. So, we’ll see.
posted by Rich Miller
Wednesday, Sep 10, 25 @ 2:17 pm
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Raising an entire community’s/local area’s power and water bills in order to get a few dozen permanent, post construction jobs at a data center has always seemed like a dubious proposition to me.
Comment by Benniefly2 Wednesday, Sep 10, 25 @ 2:52 pm
It sounds like he hasn’t read the bill.
Comment by ;) Wednesday, Sep 10, 25 @ 3:19 pm
Are data centers being built in Illinois? Haven’t they been chased off like the rest of business?
Comment by Overton Wednesday, Sep 10, 25 @ 4:14 pm
I was also under the impression that, once constructed, data centers employ very few people. The jobs are temporary jobs to build them. Still good jobs but not permanent jobs.
Comment by Jobs Wednesday, Sep 10, 25 @ 4:21 pm