A crypto plant wants to become an AI data center — and neighbors are already losing sleep
In North Tonawanda, NY, noise complaints and a lawsuit are testing whether AI's power and cooling needs can land in a neighborhood without a fight.
What happened: A cryptomining plant in North Tonawanda, New York — already the target of resident noise complaints and a class-action lawsuit filed in April — wants to convert into an AI data center. Nearby couple Paul and Sharon Demers say they can no longer sleep with windows open because of the noise. The city has extended a one-year moratorium on the facility while it investigates, and New York Governor Kathy Hochul has gone further: on July 14 she signed the nation's first statewide moratorium on new, large-scale AI data center development, pausing projects in Niagara Falls and the Town of Tonawanda too.
Why it matters: AI feels invisible in a chatbot window, but it runs on thousands of GPUs generating heat and drawing heavy electricity, housed in real buildings next to real houses. Western New York is attractive to developers precisely because its climate and industrial land are useful — but University at Buffalo professor Kevin Cleary warns the region has been burned before by industry that didn't clean up after itself, pointing to Love Canal and the old Tonawanda Coke site. The current fight is over whether AI infrastructure repeats that pattern or funds its own fixes.
How it works, plainly: Servers running AI workloads must stay within a narrow temperature range, and cooling them with air conditioning costs energy. Cleary notes Buffalo's outdoor air is cold enough to cool servers naturally 95-99% of the year, which is a real efficiency advantage over hotter regions. But the facilities still need major electrical upgrades, and Cleary argues companies should help pay for that infrastructure and invest in renewable power rather than pushing costs onto residents and local grids.
The rollout: The state's Department of Environmental Conservation says the current facility's generating station complies with its air permit, but that doesn't address the noise issue, which falls under local rules the city says are being violated. The company behind the plant, World Generation X (formerly Digi Power X), did not respond to requests for comment or a facility tour. With Hochul's moratorium in place, New York now has time to write AI-specific rules before more towns face the same decision North Tonawanda already is.