HR6179-119

What This Bill Does

The Clean Cloud Act adds a new Clean Air Act section on emissions from data centers and cryptomining facilities. It applies to covered data centers and cryptomining facilities with more than 100 kilowatts of installed information technology nameplate power, including federally owned data centers. EPA, working with the Energy Information Administration, must collect annual information from covered facility owners and serving electric utilities, including facility location and balancing authority, facility type, owner, utility, total electricity use, behind-the-meter electricity use, power sources, power-purchase agreements, grid electricity use, utility resource mix, and customer rates for the current and prior three years. EPA must calculate greenhouse gas emissions intensity for grid-supplied and behind-the-meter electricity, make public facility-level location, type, owner, utility, power-source mix, emissions intensity, and owner-level aggregate electricity use, and protect specified consumption and rate data as confidential business information. EPA must publish regional grid emissions baselines by December 31, 2025, reduce those baselines from 2027 through 2034, set them to zero in 2035 and later, and beginning in 2026 assess fees tied to emissions above baseline. Utilities pay fees for grid electricity consumed by covered facilities and may not pass those costs to non-covered customers; violations trigger fines equal to twice the improper recoupment. Covered facility owners pay separate fees for behind-the-meter electricity emissions above baseline, unless the facility is powered entirely by zero-carbon electricity. Fee revenue funds EPA administration, grants to lower residential electricity costs, and zero-carbon generation or long-duration storage deployment.

Who Benefits and How

Residential electricity consumers benefit because 25 percent of fee and penalty revenue is directed to State, Tribal, municipal, and utility programs that lower residential electricity costs through savings or rebates. Zero-carbon generation developers benefit because 70 percent of fee and penalty revenue supports grants, rebates, advanced market commitments, or low-interest loans for eligible clean generation assets. Long-duration energy storage developers benefit because the same deployment funding covers storage that can discharge at rated power for at least 10 hours. Energy researchers and public-interest groups benefit from annual public disclosure of covered facility location, owner, electricity-source mix, emissions intensity, and aggregate owner consumption. Covered facilities powered entirely by zero-carbon electricity benefit because they are exempt from the emissions fee.

Who Bears the Burden and How

Data center owners above 100 kilowatts must report electricity use, behind-the-meter generation, power-purchase agreements, owner information, and other facility data each year. Cryptomining facility owners above 100 kilowatts must comply with the same annual reporting rules and may owe behind-the-meter emissions fees. Electric utilities serving covered facilities must report grid electricity use, power-source mix, customer rates, and pay emissions fees for covered-facility grid electricity above regional baselines. Electric utilities face fines if they recoup covered-facility fee costs from customers that are not covered facilities. EPA climate program staff must publish baselines, calculate emissions intensity, disclose public data, assess fees, impose penalties, and administer revenue programs. EIA data staff must coordinate annual data collection, resource-mix accounting, and compliance monitoring with EPA.

Key Provisions

• Requires annual EPA and EIA data collection from covered data center owners and cryptomining facility owners.
• Requires annual data collection from electric utilities serving covered facilities.
• Requires public disclosure of covered facility location, owner, utility, power-source mix, emissions intensity, and aggregate owner electricity use.
• Establishes declining regional greenhouse-gas emissions baselines beginning with EPA publication by December 31, 2025.
• Imposes emissions fees beginning in 2026 on utilities and covered facility owners for electricity emissions above regional baselines.
• Prohibits utilities from shifting covered-facility emissions fees onto non-covered customers and authorizes double-recoupment fines.
• Appropriates fee revenue for EPA administration, residential electricity cost relief, zero-carbon generation, and long-duration energy storage.