California local governments filed 10 CEQA notices to halt or ban data centers in 2026, after none in 2024 or 2025

The 10 notices

Nine of the 10 are notices of exemption. Three cite Class 8, a categorical exemption for regulatory actions that protect the environment. Five cite §15061(b)(3), the rule for activities that can have no significant effect, filed under the status “Other”; Banning cites §15183. Monterey Park's March ballot measure came as a notice of determination. Four notices extend moratoriums adopted earlier.

During 2026, CEQAnet also shows five new or expanded data center projects: Prime Data Centers expansion, McClellan (Sacramento County, February 25, 2026); 300 Holger Way Data Center (San José, July 16, 2026); Northtown Backup Generating Facility (San José, July 21, 2026); Vernon Backup Generating Facility (Vernon, August 5, 2026); Golden Valley Technology Hub (Kern County, November 2, 2026). One, 300 Holger Way in San José, used a Class 32 infill exemption. SB 887, signed September 21, 2026, bars data centers from categorical exemptions for discretionary approvals after January 1, 2027.

How we counted

1. We exported every CEQAnet document, all types, received from January 2018 through the read date, one month at a time (a search over 10,000 results can't be downloaded): 134,410 unique documents.
2. We kept any document with “data center”, “data centre”, “datacenter”, “server farm” or “hyperscale” in its title, project title, description or exemption reasons: 147 documents.
3. We read all 147. A notice counts here if it imposes, extends or proposes a moratorium or a ban on data centers. Benicia's October 28, 2026 zoning amendment sets regulations without halting data centers, so it isn't counted. Each notice is counted once, by CEQAnet's “Received” date. One local government may file more than one.
4. We repeated the export for January 2024 to the read date and recounted it with a separately written script. Both runs found the same 58,196 documents, the same 10 notices and the same months. The export also matched CEQAnet's own totals for October 2026 (1,829 documents) and March 2024 (1,605).

What this data can't say

• It is a floor, not a census. Filing a notice of exemption is optional, and a council can adopt a moratorium without filing one. Moratorium Nation, Michael Bommarito's inventory, lists 28 California data center moratoriums (active, extended, expired or replaced). Six of the eight local governments above are on it; we found no CEQAnet moratorium notice from the other 22 on that list.
• Before January 1, 2024, local agencies did not have to send exemption or determination notices to the Clearinghouse, so we make no claim about earlier years.
• It depends on the agency's words. A notice that never says data center (or one of our other terms) is invisible to this search.
• It records filings, not effect. It can't say why a council acted, whether a moratorium stopped any project, or whether one is still in force; some have since been extended or replaced.
• November 2026 is incomplete and not charted: the export ends at documents received November 6, and none of those was a moratorium or ban notice.

Credit: the notices are written and filed by the local governments above and published by the State Clearinghouse, in the Governor's Office of Land Use and Climate Innovation. The moratorium inventory is Michael Bommarito's.

Sources

1. CEQAnet database search and CSV export, all document types, January 2018 to the read date. State Clearinghouse, Governor's Office of Land Use and Climate Innovation (LCI). Read November 9, 2026.
2. Environmental Document Submission (SB 69 filing rule, from 2024). State Clearinghouse, LCI. Read November 9, 2026.
3. Moratorium Nation: California local moratoria (inventory of November 8, 2026). Michael Bommarito. Read November 9, 2026.
4. California's 2026 Data Center Laws: What You Need to Know (SB 887). Holland & Knight. Read November 9, 2026.