---
title: "Moratorium: what it means · The AI Compute Race · DRYBURGH"
source: https://dryburgh.com/vol1/glossary/moratorium
description: "Moratorium: A pause, such as one on the processing of new datacenter rezonings, site plans and building permits. Chapter 9."
---

# Moratorium

What does “Moratorium” mean?

MoratoriumA pause, such as one on the processing of new datacenter rezonings, site plans and building permits. *Chapter 9.*

From *The AI Compute Race*. [Read the book](https://dryburgh.com/vol1#buy)

## Where the book uses it

- [Chapter 9 — The Price of Permission](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/notes/chapter-9)Who gets to say yes or no to a campus: counties, air regulators, courts and legislatures, and what their permits, abatements and refusals cost in time and money.

## Where the record uses it

- Scorecard indicator [Local restrictions/barriers](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/scorecard#row-31)

## Also discussed in

- Person [Abbott, Greg](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/people#abbott-greg)

## Sources that use it

- City of Hillsboro, Oregon, City Council, Resolution No. 2932, a moratorium under ORS 197.505 to 197.540 adopted “at a special meeting held on the 27th day of July 2026”, with Exhibit A, its findings of fact, and City of Hillsboro, “Land Use Moratorium Enacted on Data Centers & BESS Facilities,” notice of 27 July 2026 (section 1: “No person shall submit, and the City shall not accept, process, or approve, any new application for land use approval under the Hillsboro Community Development Code for a new data center or battery energy storage system as a primary use, or expansion of an existing data center or battery energy storage system as a primary use”; section 5: “for a period of 120 calendar days, unless earlier extended or repealed”; the findings: “the only effect on other local governments that can reasonably be anticipated is a potential for data center or BESS facility developments to shift to other locations”, and “the needed supply of data centers in the City has already been exceeded”; the notice: “Projects that submitted applications before the moratorium may continue to develop”; the resolution read in the council’s meeting-materials copy, unsigned, its adoption on 27 July from the notice). [In the Sources](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/sources/filing#hillsboro-res-2932-jul26)
- Kathy Hochul, Executive Order No. 62, “Establishing a Temporary Moratorium on Data Centers in New York While the State Develops…”, 14 July 2026 (the abeyance clause; “not … determined to be complete”; the local carve-out; the 50 megawatt definition, facilities that “consume or can consume 50 megawatts of energy or more” (Definition, the third characteristic); “beneficiary pays”; “should not be paid for by every-day New Yorkers”; the proviso: a facility primarily used for manufacturing, research, education or the provision of medical care “is not covered by this definition and thus not subject to this Executive Order”). [In the Sources](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/sources/filing#ny-eo62-jul26)
- Office of Governor Kathy Hochul, “First Statewide Moratorium on New Hyperscale Data Centers Launched…,” 14 July 2026 (the Executive Order creating “the nation’s first moratorium on new hyperscale data centers”, which “will be in place” during the development of the generic environmental impact statement, “which will take up to a year”). [In the Sources](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/sources/filing#hochul-moratorium)
- S. 4214, 119th Congress, Artificial Intelligence Data Center Moratorium Act, introduced in the Senate by Bernie Sanders on 25 March 2026 and referred to the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, as printed by the Government Publishing Office (“To impose a moratorium on the construction of new data centers until legislation is enacted that safeguards the public from the dangers of artificial intelligence”; section 3(b): “the construction or upgrading of new or existing artificial intelligence data centers may not commence or proceed until” laws are enacted that, among other conditions, ensure “the Federal Government shall review and approve artificial intelligence products before those products are released” and that affected communities “are empowered to approve or reject the construction or upgrading of that artificial intelligence data center”; section 3(a) defines the center by the same tests as S. 4825, a site “used for the development or operation of artificial intelligence models at scale” or one with “a maximum rated power capacity or total peak power load in excess of 20 megawatts” that can “deliver 20 kilowatts or more of electrical power to a single server rack” or is built for liquid cooling; a bill as introduced, not law; its latest action in Congress’s bill-status record, “Read twice and referred to the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation.” (25 March 2026)). [In the Sources](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/sources/filing#s4214-119)
- Senators John Fetterman and Dave McCormick (Pennsylvania), on stage at the All-In Liquidity Summit, Napa Valley, recorded late May or early June 2026, published 10 June 2026 (Fetterman on moratoria at 3:27 and 35:57, the speakers settled by seat and by the frames, a voice comparison having refused; McCormick on Homer City at 29:59–30:15; McCormick on the opposition at 30:35–30:40, “there’s enormous misinformation. And I think that misinformation is largely being driven by China and outside forces”; McCormick on the covenant, “there needs to be a much clearer covenant of what it means”, and the next grievances at 30:56–31:25; the covenant line’s “If you’re gonna have a data center” and “the schools are gonna be crowded” on five of six decodes where the auto caption expands gonna to going to, the print taking the tape’s word; a doubled the of the caption removed from “the schools are gonna be crowded”; on the covenant line “in your community” is the caption’s reading and one decode’s of six, the others hearing community, to community, in the community and data-centered community; “China first kinds of policy” with kinds on every decoder and the caption against a loudness profile that finds no /s/ after it; method: the original track decoded in five windows on medium.en and large-v3 on 26 September 2026, held in book 1’s Quote audio checks folder of 25 September; Fetterman: “Moratorium for data centers, for me, that’s a China first kinds of policy” (3:27–3:33) and “vote me out if you think it’s okay to give China a benefit to win the AI race” (35:57–36:03); McCormick: “there needs to be a much clearer covenant of what it means. If you’re gonna have a data center in your community, and you’re a township supervisor, here’s what you know” (30:55–31:03) and “as soon as you get through that, they move to the next thing, which is water. And then the schools are gonna be crowded” (31:21–31:25)). [In the Sources](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/sources/interview#allin-fetterman-mccormick-jun26)

And 2 more: [search the Sources](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/sources).

## Related terms

- [Agreed order](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/glossary/agreed-order)
- [Catalytic controls](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/glossary/catalytic-controls)
- [Clean Air Act](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/glossary/clean-air-act)
- [Consent](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/glossary/consent)
- [Evidentiary hearing](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/glossary/evidentiary-hearing)
- [Injunction](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/glossary/injunction)
- [Mobile and temporary](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/glossary/mobile-and-temporary)
- [Moot](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/glossary/moot)
- [NAACP](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/glossary/naacp)
- [Nitrogen oxides](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/glossary/nitrogen-oxides)
- [Nonroad engine](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/glossary/nonroad-engine)
- [Southaven](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/glossary/southaven)

From the glossary of The AI Compute Race.

- [Campuses](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/ledger)
- [Tests](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/tests)
- [Scorecard](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/scorecard)
- [Data](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/data/releases)
- [Chapter by chapter](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/companion)
- [The record at a glance](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/observatory)
- [The machine](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/machine)
- [One campus, four futures](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/hyperion)
- [Glossary](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/glossary)
- [People](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/people)
- [Sources](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/sources)
- [Notes](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/notes)
- [Where the book was wrong](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/corrections)
- [Where its sources were wrong](https://dryburgh.com/corrections?book=vol1)
- [The Paper](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/paper)
- [Consent](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/consent)
- [Who builds and pays](https://dryburgh.com/vol1/parties)

*The AI Compute Race: Five Races, One Machine* is a book by Lee S. Dryburgh, the first volume of THE COMPUTE ECONOMY, published by Dryburgh, an imprint of Contestra OÜ, Tallinn, Estonia; its record closes on 8 November 2026.

[About the book](https://dryburgh.com/vol1)[Tell me when it is out](https://dryburgh.com/vol1#notify)