If it sounds like collusion and smells like collusion.. can we call it collusion?

Why did NMED, the state "Environment Department," charged with the mission "to protect and restore the environment and to foster a healthy and prosperous New Mexico for present and future generations," argue in support of Project Jupiter's absurd and insulting demand for an expedited August hearing on their enormous air pollution permit application? The timeline proposed would have required intervenors to file any dispositive motions within two days of Wednesday's procedural conference. A conference that intervenors and the public learned would take place just two days beforehand!

This is not how regulatory oversight is supposed to operate.

Project Jupiter's lawyer, Jennifer Bradfute (yes, the same Bradfute of WATR Alliance fracking reuse infamy!) tried to jam through other illegal requirements, arguing that the opposition should be required to combine testimony and experts to help expedite the case, and claiming that no discovery should be allowed. NMED tried to support Project Jupiter's demand for an August hearing, but even they had to acknowledge that stripping intervenors of their due process rights was a bridge too far.

Ultimately the Hearing Examiner ordered the hearing to begin October 19th, a slightly better outcome, but still an absurdly compressed timeline for what promises to be a highly technical and contentious hearing.

The public should be outraged that the very department charged with protecting New Mexico's environment appears to be working hard to expedite a project that will set back our state's climate progress for twenty years.

The Rio Grande is dry, joined in its sad death by the dried up carcasses of beavers, birds and fish that its waters once nourished. Our farms, our gardens, our long-standing trees. Every living thing. All are struggling to hang on as New Mexico faces severe drought and global temperatures that are thus far this year the third highest on record.

People are dying from the heat, smoke and floods all around us, and yet the very agency tasked to "foster a healthy and prosperous New Mexico for present and future generations" is actively working to make these problems worse. At this point in human history you are either working against fossil fuels or you are an agent of death and ecocide. It's time for NMED to choose.

PROJECT JUPITER IS NOT THE ONLY CLIMATE DESTROYING DATA CENTER PROJECT PLANNED IN NEW MEXICO USE THIS TOOLKIT TO PROTECT YOUR LOCAL COMMUNITY

After the victory in Santa Fe and Socorro last month, where activists managed to pass local data center development moratoriums to buy time for protective regulations to be implemented, we were approached by multiple communities looking for resources to pass their own moratoriums. In Sierra County, where Spaceport is looking to build six data centers, in Raton where developers signed an MOU with county officials, and in Rio Arriba County where land is plentiful and regulations are lax, communities are organizing to take proactive steps to protect their air, water, land and quality of life. You can do the same! If not you then who?

1. Get started here, with a one page roadmap: How to Get Started.

2. Read more and start educating friends and neighbors with this basic primer on "How Data Centers Impact Communities and Policy Recommendations to Protect New Mexicans," or delve a little deeper with this longer version designed to help policy makers and advocates learn more about important areas for regulation.

3. Get prepared for questions by "Debunking Data Center Developer Economic Development Claims."

4. Choose from a variety of templates for data center moratorium ordinances that you can customize to fit your community resources, political realities and values.

5. Get in touch with us if you need support!

We know there are several NM legislators who have proposed a statewide moratorium, but there is no guarantee it will pass, especially given the power of PNM, Blackstone and data center developers who are already lobbying against the bill. Local regulatory action to protect your community is the best action you can take to protect air, land and water from the voracious appetites of the billionaires seeking to build their AI empires in our backyards.