Seattle City Council

Seattle City Council voted 9 to 0 on 9 and 10 June 2026 to enact a 365-day moratorium on new data centre loads above 20 MVA (megavolt-amperes, roughly the draw of 16,000 homes), converting the emergency ordinance it introduced on 30 April into binding law. Existing data centres are exempt and may expand under current rules. The enacted ordinance added a delivery calendar absent from the introduction: Seattle City Light must propose rate and capacity changes by 1 July, and Seattle Public Utilities must deliver a water-usage assessment by 30 October. Seattle now joins more than 70 US cities and counties with active bans or pauses.

The Seattle City Council is the nine-member legislative body of Seattle, Washington, with seats elected by district since 2015. It controls Seattle City Light, the municipally-owned utility that serves the city, giving the council direct leverage over power supply to new loads without needing to act through the state legislature or FERC. The moratorium was triggered when four developers approached Seattle City Light in a single week requesting power for five facilities totalling 369 MW, enough for roughly 300,000 homes. At least two developers withdrew before the ordinance passed. Mayor Katie Wilson had announced initial executive steps on 1 May.

Seattle's use of municipal utility authority to block data-centre loads is being watched across the US as a mechanism that FERC's RM26-4-000 order cannot reach. The binding delivery dates for City Light and SPU transform the moratorium from a freeze into an active review process with accountable milestones.