Rep. Mike Levin Introduces New Bill to Stop Data Centers from Driving Up Electricity Prices for Consumers
Washington, D.C.—Today, Reps. Mike Levin (CA-49) and Rep. Kathy Castor (FL-14) introduced the Stopping Hikes In Electricity from Large Load Demands (SHIELD) Act, a new bill to protect families and small businesses from rising electricity bills driven by the explosive growth of data centers nationwide and other large energy users.
The SHIELD Act would update federal utility policy to ensure that massive electricity users, rather than everyday ratepayers, bear the costs of the grid infrastructure they require, while incentivizing large energy consumption facilities to power their operations with zero-emission electricity.
“Families should not be forced to subsidize massive energy costs for billion-dollar companies,” said Rep. Levin. “As we advance the future of artificial intelligence and data centers , we need to ensure that there are clear rules that protect consumers from higher bills and protect our climate from higher emissions. The SHIELD Act makes sure large energy users pay their fair share for grid upgrades and incentivizes them to power their operations with clean, zero-emission electricity, without leaving consumers footing the bill.”
“Back home in Tampa Bay, families and small businesses are already facing rising energy costs and growing demands on our electric grid,” said Rep. Castor. “The SHIELD Act makes sure massive new power-hungry facilities like data centers pay their fair share, instead of shifting costs onto our neighbors, while strengthening the grid and encouraging cleaner, cheaper energy solutions that work for the community.”
U.S. annual electricity consumption hit a record high in 2025 and is expected to continue climbing in 2026, fueled in large part by AI data centers that are expected to more than double their electricity use by 2030. Electricity prices rose an average of 13% nationwide in 2025, putting a strain on family budgets.
Currently, two in three Americans say utility bills are a source of financial stress, three in four are worried about further increases, and 80 million American households are already struggling to pay their utility bills. Without protections, costly grid upgrades can end up being passed on to families and small businesses through higher electricity bills.
To meet surging demand, utilities are investing billions in new transmission and generation infrastructure, costs that are increasingly passed on to consumers. In 2024 alone, utilities in the PJM grid region, the largest grid operator region in the country, passed $4.3 billion in transmission costs to ratepayers, while higher demand drove up energy generation costs by $7.3 billion. There is an urgent need to protect consumers nationwide.
As utilities race to meet growing demand, forecasts have found that about 60% of increased demand will be met by burning fossil fuels, which will increase carbon emissions by 220 million tons.
The SHIELD Act would amend the Public Utility Regulatory Policies Act to direct state Public Utilities Commissions (PUCs) to consider implementing two new federal standards related to large load facilities to ensure that residential customers don’t have to subsidize energy costs for these facilities and that they are powered by zero emission electricity:
- The first standard would prevent households from paying for grid upgrades for energy intensive large load facilities by creating a separate rate class for large load customers, defined as facilities that use greater than 75MW of electricity. This standard would also include protections to require that costs be paid for by that customer class, including if the facility ceases operations or uses less energy than projected at the time of the upgrade.
- The second standard would create an incentive for facilities to use zero-emission electricity by prioritizing demand-side interconnection requests for large load facilities that are powered with zero-emission electricity and employ energy saving measures, such as demand response, energy efficiency, or onsite energy storage.
This bill is endorsed by Evergreen Action and Public Citizen.
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