A new bill introduced in the United States Congress addresses a problem that extends far beyond the industry it proposes to regulate: the development of large industrial infrastructure projects without adequate public disclosure of their demands on natural resources, environmental consequences, and potential costs to surrounding communities.
Representative Eugene Vindman of Virginia has introduced the Data Center Oversight Act, which would require operators of existing and proposed data centers to disclose information about their ownership, electricity consumption, water use, and other matters affecting the public.
Under the proposed legislation, companies that fail to report, submit incomplete information, or provide misleading information could face penalties of up to $1 million per day.
The legislation has not been enacted. Nevertheless, its introduction reflects growing federal legislative attention to the problem of industrial transparency.
And it raises a particularly important question for communities confronting other forms of industrial development:
If the public needs to know how much water a data center will consume during ordinary operations, should it not also know how much water might be required to extinguish a catastrophic fire at a large lithium-ion battery installation?
That question is especially relevant to the proposed Fraser Battery Energy Storage System in Delaware County, New York, within the New York City watershed.
## What the Data Center Oversight Act Would Require
Data centers supporting artificial intelligence and other digital services can require substantial quantities of electricity and, depending on their cooling systems, water.
Their development has generated public concern about pressure on local water supplies, electricity costs, infrastructure expansion, and noise.
The Data Center Oversight Act proposes mandatory reporting to the Department of Energy's Energy Information Administration.
The required disclosures would include:
- Ownership of existing and proposed facilities.
- Electricity consumption and water use.
- Costs of supplying the facilities that may be passed on to utility customers.
- Nondisclosure agreements involving facility owners and government officials.
- Whether union labor was used during construction.
- Whether facilities are located within 1,000 feet of homes, schools, hospitals, or national parks.
These are not merely technical details. They concern the ability of residents to understand what is being constructed in their communities, who controls it, and what consequences they may be required to bear.
The proposed penalties for incomplete or misleading reporting are particularly significant. They reflect the bill sponsor's position that public disclosure must be accurate and enforceable.
## The Problem Extends Beyond Data Centers
The environmental consequences of industrial infrastructure cannot always be measured by what a facility consumes during normal operations.
Some installations present a second category of resource demands: the extraordinary quantities of water, equipment, personnel, and public funds that may be needed if an industrial accident occurs.
For a large lithium-ion battery energy storage system, this distinction is critical.
A battery installation may consume relatively little water during normal operations. But a serious battery fire may require prolonged emergency intervention, and the consequences can become substantially more severe if the fire spreads beyond the installation into surrounding forests, wetlands, or combustible peat deposits.
In that situation, the question is no longer simply how much water the industrial facility uses.
It becomes how much water the surrounding environment may require to survive the consequences of the facility's failure.
## The Fraser Battery Energy Storage System: A Project in the New York City Watershed
The proposed Fraser Battery Energy Storage System would be constructed on a forested mountain ridge in the Town of Hamden, Delaware County, New York.
The location is within the watershed supplying drinking water to New York City.
The project has been publicly described as having storage capacity of approximately 500 to 540 megawatt-hours (MWh).
However, the project's December 14, 2025, emergency response plan identifies 196 Tesla Megapack 2 XL units, each rated at 3,916 kilowatt-hours.
The resulting calculation is:
196 × 3,916 kWh = 767,536 kWh, or 767.536 MWh.
That figure is approximately 42.1% greater than the publicly represented 540 MWh and 53.5% greater than 500 MWh.
The discrepancy raises questions about the accuracy of public disclosures and the capacity assumptions used in evaluating the project's fire safety and emergency response requirements.
But the danger presented by the proposed location cannot be evaluated solely by examining the battery equipment.
The surrounding landscape matters.
## From a Battery Fire to a Forest Fire — and Then an Underground Peat Fire
The Fraser project is proposed for a forested ridge with nearby wetlands and reported peat deposits.
This combination presents a potential sequence of events that requires careful examination.
A serious lithium-ion battery incident may involve thermal runaway, the release of flammable gases, intense heat, and fire propagation between battery units.
If heat, flames, or burning material escape the installation, surrounding vegetation may ignite under sufficiently dry and windy conditions.
A forest fire may then spread beyond the boundaries of the industrial site.
If the fire reaches sufficiently dry combustible peat, it may ignite organic material beneath the surface.
At that point, the emergency can change from a surface fire into a persistent underground combustion problem.
Peat fires are particularly difficult to extinguish because combustion can continue beneath the surface, sometimes with limited visible flames. Burning material may remain insulated by surrounding soil and peat, and fire can reappear at the surface after apparently successful suppression.
Extinguishing such fires may require prolonged application of water, excavation, isolation of burning material, and sustained monitoring.
The existence of peat deposits near Fraser does not itself establish that they are dry enough to ignite or that a battery fire would reach them. Those are precisely the site-specific conditions that must be investigated.
The necessary inquiry includes peat depth, moisture content, seasonal groundwater levels, the continuity of combustible deposits, wind conditions, and the availability of effective firebreaks and emergency access.
Without that information, the potential extent of a fire cannot be responsibly assessed.
## How Much Water Does It Take to Extinguish a Peat Fire?
Historical peat and wetland fires demonstrate the extraordinary scale of water management that may be necessary.
One example is the 2008 Evans Road Fire in North Carolina, which burned approximately 40,000 acres in and around the Pocosin Lakes National Wildlife Refuge.
The fire persisted for months, involving deep organic soils and requiring extensive suppression and water-management operations.
Approximately 1.98 billion gallons of water have been cited in accounts of the response.
That figure illustrates the possible scale of water involved in a prolonged peatland fire response. It should not be treated as a prediction of the amount Fraser would require, or as a universal measure of water applied directly to burning peat.
Another example is the 2018 Lake Cobrico peat fire in Victoria, Australia.
That incident required extensive water-delivery operations, including construction of a pipeline approximately four kilometers long. Approximately 65 million liters, or 17.2 million U.S. gallons, have been reported in connection with the suppression effort.
The response continued for weeks.
These examples involve different landscapes, fire conditions, water-management methods, and suppression strategies.
They do not establish that a fire at Fraser would consume equivalent quantities.
They do establish something important: a peat fire can turn an initially localized ignition into a prolonged emergency requiring water resources on a scale far beyond ordinary industrial firefighting.
That possibility deserves investigation before a large lithium-ion battery installation is placed near combustible forest and peatland environments.
## Where Would the Water Come From?
For the Fraser project, the water question has particular significance because of its location in the New York City watershed.
The project is proposed in mountainous terrain, with seasonal road limitations and emergency response resources that warrant careful evaluation.
The December 2025 emergency response plan contemplates a response in which firefighters may have to maintain defensive positions and allow affected battery equipment to burn.
Such an approach raises a further question: what happens if the fire does not remain confined to the battery installation?
If flames spread into surrounding forest, firefighters may need substantial quantities of water to protect adjacent vegetation, prevent additional ignitions, and suppress any burning organic soils.
If peat becomes involved, water requirements could continue long after the initial battery fire.
The public should therefore be told:
- What quantity of water has been calculated for the worst credible fire scenario, including off-site fire propagation?
- Where would that water be obtained?
- Could the necessary water be delivered over the existing mountain roads?
- What equipment and personnel would be available for prolonged forest and peat-fire suppression?
- Has the developer investigated the depth, distribution, and seasonal moisture conditions of nearby peat deposits?
- What would prevent contaminated firefighting runoff, ash, and sediment from reaching wetlands and downstream water resources?
These questions are especially important where local emergency response depends on volunteer fire departments and specialized resources may not be immediately available.
## The New York City Watershed: Water Supply at Risk From Both Fire and Firefighting
The New York City drinking water supply is an extraordinary public resource.
Much of the City's upstate water supply benefits from a watershed protection system that allows it to operate without conventional filtration of its Catskill/Delaware supply, subject to federal drinking water requirements.
A major fire within the watershed could create several distinct threats.
Burned vegetation and disturbed soils can increase erosion and sediment transport into streams and reservoirs.
Ash and fire residues may alter water chemistry and introduce contaminants.
Firefighting water may carry combustion byproducts and other substances into surrounding soils and drainage systems.
And if a fire becomes established in organic soils, prolonged suppression may require substantial water withdrawals, diversion, pumping, and transport.
A fire involving lithium-ion batteries introduces additional questions about the composition of fire residues and contaminated runoff.
The consequences would depend on the nature and scale of the incident, the affected drainage basin, weather conditions, and the effectiveness of containment measures.
But those uncertainties make advance investigation more important, not less.
The same water resources that must be protected from contamination may also be called upon to suppress the fire threatening them.
The potential costs are not limited to firefighting.
They may include emergency infrastructure, environmental remediation, water quality monitoring, watershed restoration, and measures necessary to preserve drinking water quality.
These are costs that may ultimately fall upon the public rather than the industrial developer.
## Why Is Congress Demanding Water Disclosures From Data Centers but Not Comparable Emergency Water Assessments From Battery Developers?
The Data Center Oversight Act focuses on the ordinary water and electricity demands of data centers.
That is a legitimate public concern.
But the proposed Fraser project illustrates why disclosure obligations should also address extraordinary resource demands arising from foreseeable industrial emergencies.
A data center may use water continuously for cooling.
A battery storage installation may have comparatively modest routine water consumption, yet present a potential emergency involving extensive water use if a fire spreads into the surrounding environment.
Both situations implicate public water resources.
Both may affect neighboring communities.
Both require accurate technical information that the developer is better positioned to obtain and disclose.
And both raise the question of whether local residents should be required to discover material information through independent investigation, public records requests, or litigation.
The introduction of federal legislation addressing one industry provides an opportunity to examine why comparable transparency requirements should not extend to other industrial facilities presenting substantial environmental risks.
## Industrial Transparency Is Becoming a National Legislative Question
The Data Center Oversight Act is not law. Its introduction does not establish a binding national disclosure policy, and the bill does not regulate battery energy storage systems.
It does, however, demonstrate that concerns about industrial secrecy, resource consumption, and public accountability have reached the federal legislative agenda.
The issues being raised in Delaware County are therefore part of a much broader public discussion.
The Fraser project raises particularly consequential questions because its potential environmental effects extend beyond the installation itself and into a watershed serving millions of people.
The public capacity discrepancy, the proposed forested location, the reported peat deposits, the limitations of emergency access, and the potential demand for firefighting water all warrant examination.
On November 3, 2026, a federal lawsuit was filed concerning the proposed Fraser Battery Energy Storage System, asserting New York common-law nuisance claims and seeking declaratory and injunctive relief.
The lawsuit places the proposed project's safety and environmental consequences before a federal court.
The broader public policy question remains equally important.
## The Public Needs Accurate Information Before the Emergency
Industrial developers routinely provide projections of their projects' economic benefits, operational capacities, and expected performance.
Communities also need reliable information about the costs and consequences of failure.
For a battery energy storage installation in a forested watershed, that means investigating the possibility of a battery fire spreading to surrounding vegetation, the conditions under which peat deposits could ignite, the resources required for suppression, and the consequences for public water supplies.
The historical experience of major peat fires demonstrates why these questions cannot be dismissed as remote abstractions.
The quantities of water involved in some prolonged suppression operations have reached millions and even billions of gallons.
No responsible prediction of Fraser's emergency water requirements can be made without site-specific investigation and modeling.
That is exactly why the investigation must occur before construction.
Congress is now considering whether data center operators should face penalties of up to $1 million per day for failing to disclose material information about their facilities.
The same emerging concern for industrial transparency should prompt a broader national discussion about battery energy storage systems and other installations capable of imposing extraordinary environmental and emergency response costs on the public.
The question is not merely how much water an industrial facility will consume while everything works as planned.
The question is also how much water, public money, and environmental damage may be involved when things go wrong — and whether the public is entitled to know those risks before the project is built.
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