OpenAI drops data center NDAs after voters say no

OpenAI read the election results and changed its terms. The open question is how many of its data centers the new terms reach.

On Nov. 5, two days after the midterms, OpenAI published voluntary commitments for its data center sites in a "National Community Compact" and a "Policy Blueprint," The Decoder reported. OpenAI also wants lawmakers to make the rules binding on the whole industry.

No more NDAs with local officials

At sites it owns and operates, OpenAI says it will:

• Stop requiring nondisclosure agreements in negotiations with local authorities. Trade secrets, security concerns and competitively sensitive information stay exempt.
• Cover the full cost of electricity and grid upgrades.
• Throttle power use during peak hours.
• Publish construction plans, noise studies and water usage data.

OpenAI policy chief Chris Lehane promised 2,500 jobs in Ohio, speaking to Reuters, and OpenAI points to $4.8 million for school lunches in Georgia, where planned project costs top $30 billion, per The Decoder.

Semafor reported that OpenAI pledged its facilities won't raise energy costs for residents, and that it now calls data centers "compute campuses."

Lehane told Reuters the facilities won't be a black box, according to The Decoder, and he acknowledged that projects could face delays.

The scope is the story

The timing explains itself. Voters turned down data centers in 40 of 41 local ballot measures this week, as TopFive reported Thursday, and AI stocks fell hard the next day.

So read the fine print. The pledges cover only future sites OpenAI owns and operates, per The Decoder. Many of its data centers are built and held by partners such as Oracle, and whether those are covered is unclear.

The Georgia numbers make the point in two lines.

$4.8 million for school lunches.

More than $30 billion for the project.

AI safety advocates appear skeptical about the outreach, Semafor reported. That doubt is fair. So is this: an NDA ban and published water data are things a town can check for itself.

What it means if you live near a site, or build on OpenAI

If you live near a proposed OpenAI-owned campus, the disclosure pledge gives you something concrete to ask for: the construction plan, the noise study and the water numbers. Ask early, before the zoning vote.

If you build on OpenAI's models, this is a supply story more than a PR one. New capacity depends on sites getting approved. Every delayed campus is compute that arrives later than planned, and that shows up in rate limits long before it shows up in a press release.

Watch the partners

Protests against data centers are planned this weekend in Australia and several European countries, Semafor reported. That makes this a test well beyond US towns.

The next signal is whether Oracle and OpenAI's other building partners sign on to the same terms, and whether any lawmaker picks up the blueprint.

Owned sites are the easy part. Watch the partners.