Chatt TFP: 2 wire stories: data center energy costs and state agency anti0AI campaign
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Report: Tennesseans living near data centers see bigger jumps in electricity costs
10 hours, 32 minutes ago by Anna Blubaugh / Nashville Banner
Gas turbines are seen at the xAI facility in Memphis. Data centers such as the xAI facility in Memphis drive up electricity costs for residents who live nearby, according to a report from Think Tennessee. (AP Photo/George Walker IV)
This story was originally published by the Nashville Banner. Sign up for their newsletter at nashvillebanner.com/newsletters.
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Residents in areas with data centers foot more of the bill for increased electricity costs, according to a new report by nonpartisan think tank Think Tennessee.
The report released Tuesday is the first of a two-part series analyzing the impact of data centers on Tennessee communities.
According to the report, Tennessee residents living near data centers saw on average a 3.2% increase on their electricity bills between 2023 and 2024, whereas commercial consumers, such as data centers, saw their electricity bills decrease by 0.2%. Increases in Tennessee regions home to data centers outstripped increases in other parts of the state. Areas home to data centers saw a 1.6% increase between 2023 and 2024, while the statewide average was 1.3%.
Additionally, Think Tennessee found that, although commercial consumers are projected to consume energy at twice the rate of residents, regional households will face the quickest price increases — an expected 5.1% between 2022 and 2027.
According to the analysis, Tennessee's land availability, energy sources and fast-growing technology industry attract data center developers at a disproportionate rate. Currently, more than 60 data centers exist in Tennessee, and 13 either already exist or are under construction in Nashville.
Think Tennessee found that data centers have also contributed to the growth of Tennessee's average electricity consumption. Data centers consumed more than 9.2 million megawatts in the Tennessee Valley region in 2025, a sevenfold increase over five years. The amount of megawatt-hours required for operational, under-construction and planned Tennessee data centers to operate at any given time is equal to the amount of electricity required to power 1.3 million Tennessee homes per year, according to the report.
The potential impact of data centers on residential areas has sparked widespread debate locally. Proposed data centers near the Nashville Zoo and at Fisk University have heightened the visibility of the issue, and 150 people spoke at a Metro Planning Commission public hearing about new data center zoning regulations in June.
"A data center does not belong near our homes, let alone the Nashville Zoo," Nashville resident Santiago said at the meeting. "These facilities put an incredible strain on our local power grid, and hey, if we remember the ice storm, our power grid is not entirely that well suited."
The issue was set for public debate again as the zoning regulations and a proposed data center moratorium had public hearings at the Metro Council.
Mayor Freddie O'Connell is backing the bills, and filed one of his own last month. The legislation would commence the process of condemning the property next to the zoo, allowing Metro to purchase the property for fair market value without the owner's consent.
"We can support economic development while also making smart choices about the highest and best use of our land," O'Connell said in a video statement.
Think Tennessee's report highlighted similar concerns, citing risks associated with data centers that include grid strain and outages.
The report also examined existing concerns surrounding Tennessee grid reliability. More than 230,000 Nashville Electric Service customers were without power during the peak of January's ice storm, and it took two weeks for some households to regain power. The utility's system saw between $100 million and $140 million in damage following the storm.
The report warned of the importance of creating policy and legislation to manage data center growth, acknowledging both the potential economic benefit of data centers and risks of increased electrical consumption.
"Data centers are very quickly changing the energy needs of our state," said Erin Hafkenschiel, president of Think Tennessee. "And the decisions made now about planning, pricing and infrastructure will determine who bears the costs of this growth. If we don't get it right, the potential risks to household energy costs might outweigh the positive economic growth impacts."
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This article first appeared on Nashville Banner and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
‘It’s Real:’ Tennessee Department of Tourist Development launches anti-AI campaign
15 hours, 3 minutes ago by Anne Braly / Tennessee Lookout
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Tennessee Department of Tourist Development / A photo by Jared Kreiss of bears in the Smokies bears the Tennessee ‘Yeah, It's Real' seal.
It's easy to be fooled by AI photos, so in an effort to help Tennessee travelers verify where online photos were taken, the Tennessee Department of Tourist Development has launched its new "It's Real" campaign. It's a program that promises the photos you see on its website — TNVacation.com — are not AI-generated, but the real thing.
"It's a commitment to authenticity and a promise to travelers that, when it comes to Tennessee, what you see is what you get," said Mark Ezell, commissioner of the Tennessee Department of Tourist Development.
The campaign does not include filtered pictures that may make sunsets a little more brilliant or autumn leaves a little more colorful. Conversely, AI-generated photos might have a tree in a yard where there is none or a mountain in West Tennessee where the land is pancake-flat.
Ezell says it's up to his department to inspire Tennesseans and others to choose to travel in the Volunteer State and plan their experiences with confidence.
"Travelers rely heavily on photos when deciding where to go, and our survey showed that many people struggle to tell the difference between real and AI-generated images," Ezell said.
Tennessee Tourism's certification includes content credentials and secure metadata to show travelers who, when, where and what the photos they are seeing were captured. This will be done for both new and existing photos on its website.
Nancy McCullough of Brentwood, Tennessee, travels regularly in the state and has seen pictures of places she's been to and knows fully well that what she's seeing is not true to reality. And she thinks the Get Real campaign is one that travelers to the state will appreciate.
"It's a fabulous idea," she said. "It's hard enough to trust what you see on the internet these days anyway. But if you know that the Tennessee Department of Tourist Development is following the no-AI rule, then you should be able to know that 'what you see is what you get."
That's what Ezell says the Get Real campaign is all about,
"Our travelers deserve to know before they go," he said.
Geographically speaking, Tennessee is divided into three "grand divisions" — East, Middle and West — each with distinct landscapes, climates and elevations.
"Tennessee is home to some of the most beautiful landscapes, cityscapes and attractions in the country, and we believe that beauty stands on its own," Ezell said. "We also know it's getting harder to spot the difference between what's real and what's not. We want to make sure travelers know when they look at photos on TNVacation.com, they can trust that what they see is a real place captured by a real photographer."
Jared Kreiss often contributes photos seen on TNVacation.com, and while, as a professional photographer, he's usually able to distinguish between AI and real photos, he knows many people, particularly older people who may be less experienced with newer technology, cannot tell the difference, he said.
"I find it incredibly frustrating to see AI-generated images being passed off as photography of real places, and even more frustrating when people believe they're real. To me, that's deceptive," he said. "It's becoming harder and harder to tell real from AI. I am incredibly excited about this campaign and to know Tennessee's tourism department is working to preserve what is real. I think it is more important than ever to protect that. I really value that."
Costs for the Get Real campaign are incorporated into the tourism department's existing marketing efforts to introduce the certification to travelers through paid promotions. There are no significant new expenditures associated with the program, Ezell said.
According to figures released from Tourism Economics and the tourism department, 2025 was a banner year for tourism in the state with 147 million visitors spending a record $31.7 billion. That's a 3.3% year-over-year increase and 36.6% growth since 2018.
"Our job is to market Tennessee and help bring visitors to our state," Ezell said. "Giving travelers the confidence in what they see helps support that mission. Using real and authentic photos for our marketing is a priority."
Tennessee is the first state to implement a program like this, and it's one that Ezell hopes other states will follow.
"As travelers and consumers of the internet ourselves, we've all experienced moments where we question whether what we're seeing online is real," he said. "We saw an opportunity to be proactive and help travelers feel more confident when they choose to travel to Tennessee. Our job is to bring people to Tennessee and show them the beauty of our state, and we rely heavily on photos to do that."
Read more at TennesseeLookout.com.