Imperial County AI data center stalled by court-ordered CEQA review, Guardian reports

A county judge ruled last month that developer Sebastian Rucci’s proposed AI data center in unincorporated Imperial County, California, a nearly 1 million-square-foot site planned with 330 megawatts of power and more than 130 methane-gas-fueled generators, cannot move forward until it clears a full review under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA, the state’s environmental permitting law), the Guardian reports. The ruling came in a lawsuit by the city of Imperial, later joined by the Sierra Club, challenging the county’s April approval of the project, which had sought an exemption from that review. The Imperial Irrigation District rejected the project’s application for water, which Rucci puts at about 750,000 gallons a day; he denies the project will harm the area, has sued the utility, and says he will challenge the ruling.