AB 222: Data centers: energy usage reporting and modeling.

Existing law, on or before January 1, 2026, and before each time thereafter that a generative artificial intelligence system or service, as defined, or a substantial modification to a generative artificial intelligence system or service, released on or after January 1, 2022, is made available to Californians for use, regardless of whether the terms of that use include compensation, requires a developer of the system or service to post on the developers internet website documentation regarding the data used to train the generative artificial intelligence system or service.

This bill would require a data center that provides computing resources to a developer for the purpose of developing a covered model, as defined, to estimate the total energy used to develop the covered model and to report that information to the developer, as specified. The bill would require a developer, before using the computing resources of a data center to develop a covered model, to inform the data center of the developers intent to develop a covered model. The bill would require a developer, before using a covered model or covered system commercially or making a covered model or covered system available for use by a third party, to request its energy usage data from all data centers involved in developing the covered model and to estimate and publish on its internet website the total energy used to develop the covered model, as specified.

Existing law requires the State Energy Resources Conservation and Development Commission (Energy Commission) to biennially adopt an integrated energy policy report, as specified, and to make the reports accessible to state, local, and federal entities and to the general public.

This bill would require the Energy Commission to require operators of data centers to annually report energy consumption and performance data, as specified. The bill would require the Energy Commission to include energy consumption trends for data centers in its integrated energy policy reports. The bill would require the Energy Commission to adopt energy efficiency performance standards, as described, for data centers. The bill would require the Energy Commission to adopt regulations to implement these requirements on or before January 1, 2027.

Existing law vests the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) with regulatory authority over public utilities, including electrical corporations. Existing law authorizes the PUC to fix the rates and charges for every public utility, and requires that those rates and charges be just and reasonable.

This bill would require the PUC to determine whether those costs and expenses in an application by an electrical corporation to recover costs and expenses arising from, or incurred as a result of, the construction of a new data center or a substantial alteration to an existing data center are just and reasonable. The bill would require the PUC to minimize the shifting of costs attributable to the construction or alteration of the data center to ratepayers who do not directly benefit from the data center.