Data center backlash echoes fossil-fuel politics

Willie Nelson has become an unlikely barometer of America's biggest infrastructure fights.

He once protested the Keystone XL pipeline and fracking.

Today, he's fighting data centers.

Why it matters: The American icon's latest cause underscores how the politics surrounding AI infrastructure are beginning to resemble the last decade's fights over fossil fuels.

"The last thing we need is a loud, water thieving, light polluting, data center anywhere near our town (or any others for that matter)," Nelson told his more than one million Instagram followers recently.

Flashback: "For 29 years, corporations have continued to take the land away from the small family farmers, and this is what we're here to fight against," Nelson said during a 2014 Nebraska concert held to oppose the Keystone XL pipeline.

"We always listen to our Yoda," joked Nebraskan activist Jane Kleeb, referring to Nelson.

A leader of Nebraska's fight against the now-cancelled Keystone XL pipeline, today Kleeb is active in the largely decentralized opposition to AI infrastructure.

The big picture: Data centers represent one of the fastest-growing, most bipartisan infrastructure backlashes in years.

"We just want to make sure when these massive infrastructure projects are being built, that they're not leaving harms in the communities that will live with them forever," said Kleeb, who is co-founder of the nonprofit Bold Alliance and chair of the Nebraska Democratic Party.

How it works: The parallels between the fossil-fuel sector and data centers are striking.

Tech companies have been touting how essential data centers are to our lives, which echoes how fossil-fuel companies remind us we use oil and natural gas to move around.

Kleeb says many developers approach communities with a "tech bro" mentality that leaves residents feeling unheard.

What they're saying: "You don't get your social license to operate by telling everybody how they're going to do better economically," said Kevin Book, managing director at the nonpartisan research firm ClearView Energy Partners, whose clients include institutional investors and corporate leaders.