$130 Billion in Projects Shelved: How Water Panic Broke the U.S. Datacenter Boom

More than $130 billion in U.S. datacenter projects was delayed or abandoned in Q1 2026, and water arrived before power as the binding constraint. Across more than 20 states, moratoriums and permitting overhauls have frozen roughly a third of the new-build pipeline. Closed-loop and immersion cooling can solve the problem; the capex delta means only hyperscalers are currently able to absorb it.