Unions come out in support of data centers | Hour 3

What's going on? Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. It is heard live every day from noon to three on WBT radio in Charlotte. And if you want exclusive content like invitations to events, the weekly live stream, my daily show prep with all the links, become a patron, go to the Pete calendar show.com. Make sure you hit the subscribe button, get every episode for free, right to your smartphone or tablet. And again, thank you so much for your support. All right. So I have more audio from last night, Charlotte city council meeting. Last hour, we heard from all the Marxists who showed up. They're opposed to the data centers. They don't want any data centers built. The city council is debating, well, they'll decide in like two weeks whether to extend the 150-day moratorium, extend it for another year, okay? And there was some discussion I caught among the city council members. There was a reference made a couple of times to this idea that the state general assembly had done a moratorium. And so what's the problem if we do, and that was weird to me because I follow state politics fairly closely and I've never heard of that. So I went looking for this legislation and what they're referring to is house bill. I have it right here. 1189 legislative, sorry, the Data Center Transparency Act. This was filed April 30th, 2026. And then it went to the Rules Committee. So that's it. It has not been, it has not been passed. Okay. So there is no statewide moratorium. So I don't know what they were talking about at the meeting last night, but apparently some of the council members seem to think that the state passed a moratorium. Now the city staff um they say that um hang on uh currently all data centers regardless of size type or capacity are treated the same under the unified development ordinance and this is problematic and i recognize this i've said this from the beginning that data centers there's not a there's not a single sort of template for every data center they come in all shapes and sizes right literally i They have, you know, different demands. They have different cooling systems, like all of this stuff. There's all these, and there are different kinds of data centers. We have data centers in Charlotte for 40 years, okay? So this idea that like a one-size-fits-all approach would work is crazy, okay? So they obviously need to figure out if they want to, for example, they want to require closed-loop cooling systems, okay? Which means that you And this is where people get hung up. There is a difference between water use and water consumption. OK, you in your house, right, you consume the water. If you have a closed loop system, you're not consuming it, but you're just using it. You're taking some water and then you're running it through the cooling system. It evaporates, you capture the water droplets, and it recycles through the system. So you're using these closed-loop systems. So you're not actually consuming the water, you're just using it. And so these closed-loop systems use very little water. In some cases, they produce water. There are some of these models that they've been building in the last six months that promise to actually put more water into the system. The electrical grid, we hear this one all the time, we're going to run out of power. Meanwhile, we're refusing to build more nuclear energy. However, and I've talked about this before, that we use energy, like if you think about, like you have these power companies, they have fixed costs, right? Which is their power generation facilities, the, you know, the poles along the road, The wires, the substations, all of those things are fixed costs. Well, if you have somebody coming online that's going to then use a lot of power, but they're going to use it consistently, which we don't. You and I do not use power consistently. We have peak periods when we use it. Everybody gets home from work. You turn on the TV, you run the dishwasher, you make dinner, right? You have to turn all the lights on, right? All of these things. So that creates a higher load demand at certain peak times. The data centers use a consistent, stable amount of energy all the time, basically. Which means what? That now you're able to, if you're selling the power, you have this increase in the power demand, but it's spread across all of the hours of the day And that then also distributes the cost to the fixed cost. It distributes that, like if I'm selling 100 megawatt hours or whatever, I forget what they break it down as, you're selling all of that. Now you're selling additional power at off-peak times that you otherwise were not selling, which means that the cost to maintain all of your substations and poles and wires, right, that's now being distributed across more kilowatt hours. That's why in some of these jurisdictions where they've studied, and it's very limited at this point, they did one in Virginia, I covered this a couple weeks ago, that people's energy prices are actually lower, like actually lower, or they are lower than they would have otherwise been had there been no data center construction. So the challenge is that when you look at the projected need, build out of what data centers are wanting to do, like all the builders want to do, which by the way, I don't think that'll materialize. I think there's a bubble and it's going to pop at some point. This AI bubble will pop. And anyway, so like the build out numbers will require more energy production. And if you're, you know, an eco wacko that doesn't want any new energy production, well, then that's a problem, right? You don't want communities building more power generation. So you have to oppose data centers because they're going to require more energy production. And the most cost effective one you can do is nuclear. So they don't want that. It's the most stable. It's the most reliable, produces the most amount of energy, and they don't want that. So that is one of the reasons why there's opposition to this. Let me play for you. This clip here, this is from.... Oh, yeah. So this was a member of the task force who spoke. The city council made up a task force. This is one of the people on the task force who spoke against this idea of extending the moratorium for a year or even longer. The Marxists wanted to go like three years. They want a three-year moratorium. My name is Tim Sinema. I had the privilege of serving on the data center task force and it is in that role from which I make these remarks. I do agree that we need more time to develop a thoughtful policy around data centers. And we absolutely should not rush a policy this important. And I don't believe we need another year to get it right. The good news is that we don't have to reinvent the wheel. Other cities and states are years ahead of us and many sound policies have already been written by them. What would a world-class Charlotte data center policy look like? What standards would satisfy us? I think nearly all reasonable people can agree that neighborhoods deserve protection, water matters, electric reliability matters, noise matters, transparency matters. And the good news is these issues have already been addressed in many other cities throughout this country. And we can learn from the progress they've made. There's a lot of misinformation. You've even heard it tonight. I toured a data center recently that's been open in Charlotte for over 20 years. It has a closed-loop water system, and in 20 years, they've added 50 gallons of water total to their system in 20 years. There's a lot of misinformation out there. Charlotte isn't deciding whether the digital economy exists. We're deciding whether it happens here under our rules or somewhere else. Where should Atrium and Novant store medical records? Charlotte's America's second largest banking center. Where should that digital infrastructure live? The data center industry is evolving rapidly, as we all know. A one-year delay has a material economic cost to Charlotte and its residents in terms of lost tax revenue and lost jobs. You heard from many people talking about jobs tonight. I hope that council and staff can work expeditiously on this important issue so Charlotte is not left behind. Thank you. Yeah, it does make me wonder, as one who has covered as a reporter and then watched all these city council meetings for the better part of 25 years, and I have seen many, many, many instances over those years where local government officials go and take a policy, a template from another city or state, and they implement it here. They look at other cities all the time. Why is this so difficult? Why does it take a whole year, as he says, to reinvent this wheel? You don't need to reinvent. The wheel. You take the policies that are beneficial, that other places have already adopted, that seem to be working to achieve the ends you want to achieve, and then you implement them here. This does not seem to be very difficult. The holidays will be here before you know it, and so now is the time to create precious and priceless family heirlooms that will last for generations. Take your old photos, slides, films, and tapes to create a video in Mint Hill. 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Last night we heard from the Party for Socialism and Liberation. We heard from the Social Justice Center and their fellow Marxists and How, you know, they're the ones that are speaking for the people, unlike, say, you know, the union workers who also showed up to support data center construction. I want to start by saying that I share the same concerns as everybody else in the audience. I believe that these data centers should pay their fair share in energy costs. I don't believe they should be located in urban areas. And, you know, I care about the environment and our health and welfare as well. But what I do want to say is that we represent roughly 1,000 members working on data center projects in the greater Charlotte area. And we only represent 15% of the electrical work done in our jurisdiction. So once you factor in the non-union sector and all the other building trades like mechanical, plumbing, sheetrock, roofing, structural steel, you name it, These are thousands of jobs. I have worked in functioning data centers as well in Forest City, where I've seen 100 construction workers working on the site after it's in operations because they're always doing upgrades and. Moving stuff around. So my message is that we shouldn't have to choose between safe communities and good jobs. Data centers have become a critical piece of work for union operators. Every campus means months of side work, clearing, grading, foundations, and crane-sealing heavy equipment. For our members, that's thousands of hours of work right here at home that brings high wages and union benefits like health care and pensions for our members and their families. That's why we want this project done right. Not a blank check and not a door slammed shut. Clear rules set by this community up front. I understand why people in this room are worried, and I respect that. This is where we live and raise our families. But I'd like you to know who's behind this work. Local 421 has hundreds of members working these projects, journeymen, apprentices, and people who came into the trade later in life. This work pays a wage you can raise a family on with health care and retirement benefits. For many of them, it's the first career they've had that offers any benefits aside from an hourly wage. What's at stake for us? We don't want to lose those jobs. However, we don't want to build anything that hurts our neighbors. We believe we can have both. The standards laborers put forward are the data centers pay their own power costs, protect our water source, respect the people who live next to them, and create union jobs and apprenticeships for people from this community. This June, AFL-CIO, the country's largest federation of unions representing over 15 million union workers nationally, adopted Resolution 7 after months of research and debate. Delegates, including from Charlotte Labor Council, were there and voted to approve it. They set four critical standards. Make sure that the developers pay their own way on energy and water, conserve energy and water, respect the neighbors, but also make sure that these are union jobs. This matters because the opportunity here is bigger than just construction. We estimate over 10,000 direct jobs across North Carolina in the data center industry in the supply chain. The plants that make the electrical equipment, cooling systems, components, many of those jobs are actually union already. And workers are actively organizing in other plants, including with the mine workers and the steel workers union. I put up the steel that holds up many of the buildings across our region from government buildings, high rises, data centers, and pharmaceutical research facilities. I'm proud of that work, but I also live here. My family pays the same power bills you do and drinks the same water. So I don't want to build something that hurts my neighbors. I want to build this community you can be proud of and help create opportunities like mine for many more apprentices across our region. Lifting the moratorium does not have to mean approving every project without conditions. It means allowing a thoughtful process that evaluates projects individually, establishes clear standards, protects our communities, and creates opportunities for responsible development. Charlotte can pursue economic growth while demanding accountability from developers. We can protect our neighborhoods while also protecting opportunities for the people who build and maintain the infrastructure our region depends on. I want to see enforceable environmental standards, transparent reporting, independent monitoring, and real consequences like penalties when developers fail to comply. I want closed-loop cooling systems and the redevelopment of existing infrastructure industrial buildings seriously considered before we sacrifice more undeveloped land. We should not have to choose between protecting our communities and protecting our livelihoods. And let's not pretend that saying no to everything makes the demand of technology disappear. Bingo. The unions are rational on this. Like they're saying this is not an either or choice, right? The Marxists are in there saying you want to stop all of the data centers. You want to just shut it all down. No new data centers to be ever be constructed in Charlotte again. And as she just pointed out there at the end, like you can say no and then other places will say yes and they will benefit. And then all of those jobs will go to those other areas. All that tax go to those other areas. So that's what the Marxists are pitching and what the unions are pitching is And I recognize this is going to be a little awkward now for Democrats because you've got two different factions of your base. Although, to be fair, union workers, they have kind of become a little bit more Republican curious. But you've got two different factions that are that are in opposition to each other on this. And you're going to have to decide not just what's best for the community, obviously, but your electoral prospects, right? Are these activists, the activist crowd, the PSL, the socialists and liberation party people, are they going to start targeting city council members in the primaries? That's where they're going to come for them. So they're going to have to weigh that. And again, as the guy from the task force pointed out in the last clip, Like there are templates for this that you can use. You can look at other cities that have done stuff with regard to like what the union is. I'm on board with what the union recommends there. I mean, of course, they throw in the fourth point about, you know, must be union labor. Like, of course, they're going to put that in there. But yes, they got to pay their own way. I've been saying that from the beginning. No discounts. You don't get reduced rates for energy or water. You pay the same way as everybody else. Right. And, um, you gotta respect the neighbors. That's a zoning issue. That's up to city council when they're giving zoning approval, make sure you've got buffers and screening for lights and noise and everything else. Right. So that's how you get at that. That's not difficult either. Okay. So like their points and what was a conserve, um, conserve energy, you know, uh, there, there were other, um, aspects that, you know, Duke energy says any new, uh, burden on the infrastructure. on the electric grid, on that infrastructure, has to be borne by the data center, right? So I believe there's one getting built, a new substation. And so it's like that's going to be on you guys, right? We're not going to build that for you. If you need more power to your facility because it uses so much, then you build the substation or you write a check to us and we'll build it. Like all of that is fair. All of that is fair. And again, this is not reinventing the wheel. All right, real quick. Every government number gets revised, right? Every projection gets walked back. Gold does not file corrections like GovCo. Revelation Gold Group helps families hold physical gold and silver, including insurance. in a tax-advantaged gold IRA. It's real, it's in your name, and 10 minutes tells you if your retirement account qualifies. If you want to learn more, go to Calendarmetals.com. That's Calendarmetals.com. There's a link in the podcast description. Or if you want to talk to somebody, you can call 888- 465-3049. So the city council in Charlotte last night did not vote on extending the moratorium, but all of the council members who spoke appear to be supportive of doing just that when they do vote in two weeks, I believe. And then LaJuana Slack-Maitfield, this was kind of odd, she and Councilman J.D. Masguerra-Sarrillas questioned one of the quote unquote experts. Like, so the city staff put up a slide and they were like, you know, we've been, you know, here are the people we've been talking to and these outside experts. And they cited the World Resources, yeah, World Resources Institute. And they put out the data center impact report. Okay. So city staff cited this report as one of the expert inputs, okay, that they had been looking to. And Mayfield and Masuera-Saurias, they were like, we're not really too sure about using this organization. Depending on which search, Google search, Yahoo search you do, the World Research Institute, Resources Institute has some challenges from community because of their board leadership, their executive leadership, the donors to their organization, which are donors that directly financially benefit from data centers. So I want to make. Sure that along with having representation from labor, understanding North Carolina is North Carolina, and we are not. A pro-union, pro-labor state. Get out and vote. Early voters getting ready to start. So when we think about who we're pulling information from to help guide us, I want to make sure that we're getting as much diversity in that reporting as possible and also acknowledging if there are community concerns across the nation for any particular resource that we're using because the reality is that almost invalidates The work that we're attempting to do, if it's an organization that has already been identified as having board members be removed, board members stepped down, tracking funding and major donations that are in contradiction. And I share Council Member Mayfield's concerns about the World Resources Institute. I was reading some reporting on them about board members... that were directly tied to benefiting from data centers, as well as greenwashing their reports as well. And not to say that these are bad faith actors, right? But, you know, follow the money is what I've always said. And although they're a left-leaning, progressive, environmentalist institution, there are some concerns about, you know, the greenwashing of what's presented to them. So I would just caution on that. This is hilarious. The World Resources Institute, this is a lefty group, okay? But now things are problematic because a lot of the money that they've been hoovering up comes from some of the very tech companies that have been trying to ingratiate themselves. I mean, let's call it what it is. These are bribes. Remember the whole ESG thing? era, remember that? Where all these companies were like, we're going to prioritize ESG investments, environment, social justice, and governance models, or whatever they were, right? To direct capital towards left-wing groups and ideas and issues, right? We're going to spend, we're going to take your 401k money and we're going to invest it in solar panels. Even though the rate of return for you as an investor is probably not great, but it means that we care. And then it's this is why I refer to it as sort of like we're going to smear the blood over the door to make sure that the leftist mob passes by. Like you get a little certificate. Oh, we're ESG compliant. Yay us. You can't boycott us now. This is what this is what they're talking about. So, yes, let's follow the money. Councilman Masueras Arias. I agree. Care to follow any money from China? Hmm. As long as we're. going to, you know, question any of the inputs based on donations from problematic entities, might as well also look at some of the opposition claims, no? By the way, I went looking for these, uh, uh, for these problems, um, Well, the main one that popped up was from actually 2019, I want to say, around that time period. And it has to do with former New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson, a Democrat. He stepped down from the World Resources Institute. I believe he was a board member, board chair or something. He stepped down because of ties to Jeffrey Epstein. Okay, so that was the big story that kept coming up in the Google and Yahoo searches. And then there was another guy, a board member, who was the founder of SoulCycle and Equinox. These are apparently luxury or high-end fitness clubs. Guy's name is Stephen Ross. And he held a fundraiser for... Donald Trump. And so that got everybody outraged. He has pumped $ 37 million into this organization, the World Resources Institute, okay? And what the Huffington Post Puffington Post reports is re-electing a president who's crippling the U.S. effort to cut climate-changing emissions directly undermines the work the WRAI is doing. About 200 staffers signed an internal petition demanding WRI hold an open meeting with Ross and overhaul the way the nonprofit appoints board members. There was also one story that I came across from the Financial Post about how two researchers resigned over a disagreement about how to calculate forced carbon accounting. So I'm not really sure what they're talking about here, although I went and looked at who the donors to the WRI include. And you got all the usual suspects. Uh, you got a lot of governments, USA ID is in there. Yeah. We, yeah, we taxpayers in America, we've been pumping tens of millions of dollars into this WRI for years and years and years. Um, according to influence watch, they receive hundreds of millions of dollars a year via grants from government agencies, private foundations, and corporations. Some of these donors include the European climate foundation, the shell foundation. So I believe that is that shell gas. Facebook. Oh, there you go. There's the problem. There's your problem. It's Facebook. The Toyota Mobility Foundation. The Walmart Foundation. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. And the MacArthur Foundation. Yes, yes. Same left-wing group that's been funding our judicial reforms, quote-unquote, here in Mecklenburg County, right? Paying to get everybody to release all of our criminals. The Institute has more than 700 experts and members of staff and conducts its activities in more than 50 countries around the world, including China. Not sure that's problematic, though, for the left. It was founded 1982, and it was founded off of a grant from the MacArthur Foundation, a left-of-center foundation that granted an average of just over $ 200 million each year to to a large number of left-wing groups and causes, including disarmament, environmentalist policy, and population control. Okay, see, so their concerns apparently are about, not Bill Richardson, their concerns are about this SoulCycle guy who did a fundraiser for Trump and Facebook, I guess. They've opposed nuclear energy. They celebrated that they got a nuclear plant shut down plans for a plant, shut down in South Africa, where, like, according to the Capital Research Center, yeah, South Africa, they've got nearly 8 million South Africans without basic access to electricity. So, good job shutting down energy for millions of people who don't have it. That's... a real feather in your cap. They also get money from the Bezos Earth Fund. That's Jeff Bezos. That's Amazon. There you go. Greenwashing. This is greenwashing. We can't trust anything that they do now. Okay. Let's find somebody else. Let me get to the text line. Beth's favorite Russ says, one of my sons said that a friend was asking him, why do we even need data centers when the cloud is already a thing? Oh my gosh. Oh, good Lord. Jeff says, so LaWanna Mayfield used Google's data centers to provide her information on why she shouldn't vote for data centers. Yes, she continues to make an excellent case for removing humans from this decision-making process. Uh, read. So is anyone who is not in favor of data centers now a Marxist? No, no. There are people that are opposed to data centers, um, that are not Marxist. But when you show up and you say that you want to overthrow the system and implement socialism, then I call you a Marxist. Um, grumpy major. Did you see that Braxton Winston was there supporting the other unions? Yes. As the local AFL-CIO head, good lord, he must be conflicted. Yeah, it's a tough spot. Democrats are in a tough spot. Gary says, I bet the people in Rock Hill and Clover, where the solar manufacturing plant had spills next to a school, would much rather have that be a data center than a solar panel plant. Yeah, that would be interesting. That would be an interesting... debate to say, okay, we're going to close down, was it SILFAB? We're going to close down the SILFAB plant like you want, but we're going to put a data center in its place. Tom says, I would not be for this project at all if there is a demand that all employees be union employees. This is not a union state. This is a free employment state. And to restrict all those people who are not members of unions, it's blatantly unfair. Yeah, I would agree with that. And that's the thing, the The city council could not make that a requirement because we're a right-to-work state. But the AFL-CIO national, this is what they promoted in their four points that they want on data centers. So of course they're going to say hire union because in some states and cities you can force them to do that, right? Seth says, weird, I don't hear the normal outbursts from the commies. Are they scared of the union workers? That's true. Last night there were no, the only boos were, were directed at Larry Shaheen, who came out there to say, hey, guys, not sure if you're actually violating state law on the moratoriums. Because the only reason you're allowed to do a moratorium, it's got to be a good faith effort. And if you're trying to pursue a path that leads you to basically banning data centers, then that's not a good faith effort, right? And so you could be running afoul of state law, and he got booed. And then some council member laughed at it. Um, and, uh, Joe says, imagine how much revenue the old Eastland mall could have generated as a data center. Instead, it's been a blight and financial black hole for multiple years. Yeah. Um, 704 numbers says, um, it doesn't make sense because the left doesn't know what they're talking about. They're brainwashed, regurgitating what they've been told. It's just narrative. If you were to ask them all the technical facts you just listed, they'd be at a loss for words because it wasn't included in the narrative. Yeah. Well, I mean, it's very easy to just say they're using all the water. They're going to strain the grid, noise pollution, you know, mental damage. Right. Like these are the like this is the language of the left. It's all emotion driven. And when you start to try to bring facts to the discussion, you start trying. It takes longer to do that. Right. And then even if you do that, they will accuse you of being corrupted somehow. Right. And that's what those council members were talking about with this World Resources Institute. report it's like now you can't trust them and again the irony there is that all this money that flowed to these types of groups these left-wing environmentalist wacko groups right the money was going there because the left basically made it a requirement that you had to bribe them to get them off your back right so you have these corporations that started throwing millions of dollars at these groups so they could check a box on their esg filings and now it's like oh Well, the World Resource Institute, they took tens of millions of dollars from Facebook and from Jeff Bezos, and they want data centers. So now you're bad. Oh, you didn't have any problem when you were taking my tens of millions of dollars? Does all this sound, Dave says, does all this sound that our current leaders do not have the aptitude to make decisions in timely fashion? What is the problem with the city, county, CMS leadership? They seem to have a lot in common. I wonder what those things are. Yeah, there are a lot. Look, they are our representatives. They really are. And like and that's the thing, like the the activists go down there and scream at city council members because they know it can work. So there are a lot. And there are I'm sure there are some of them that are going to be scared by the backlash from these Marxist groups that showed up there last night. And they're going to get voted out. Hmm. Michael says, ask Dimple Ajmera if she's... Oh, okay, that's for the morning show. Condensation, okay. Michael, there's another Michael. In all fairness, Pete, the city council is too busy going over their agendas to follow up with what has passed the General Assembly. That was the county commission that was mad that they voted for something they did not read on their own agenda. And.... Kim says, I have inspected two data centers, one in Virginia, one in South Carolina, both in residential neighborhoods. There was no noise. Property was so secure, external and internal. It was not an eyesore. Both recirculated their process water for the chillers and did not consume excess power from the grid that would impact the community. It may be an anomaly overall, but I'm tired of the knee-jerk screaming about how bad they are. Yeah, so part of this is essentially a moral panic, a contagion. These things sweep through societies. I've talked about this before. I forget what they called it at the time, but years ago, I don't know, 150 years ago, or maybe longer, and it afflicted the rich, the upper crusts, where there were a bunch of these people that started to believe that they were made out of glass. Not kidding. Like when glass became a manufactured product readily available and it was being used all over the place. And they were like these Richie Richies that were like, I made of glass. And then like, you couldn't touch them or whatever. And there was this famous story about a doctor who literally beat his patient to prove to that patient that he is not made of glass. Right. And so some of that is what's going on here. It's like the panic from fracking. It was like the panic around nuclear energy. Same sort of stuff. Except now it's turbocharged by China and the Internet. All right, that'll do it for this episode. Thank you so much for listening. I could not do the show without your support. and the support of the businesses that advertise on the podcast. So if you'd like, please support them too and tell them you heard it here. You can also become a patron at my Patreon page or go to ThePeteCalenderShow.com. Again, thank you so much for listening, and don't break anything while I'm gone.