In 1986, a gold mine opened at Summitville, Colorado, after posting a reclamation bond of less than $5 million. Six years later the company was bankrupt, acid and cyanide were leaking into the watershed, and the public was left with a cleanup bill of roughly $240 million. Colorado still pays about $2 million a year to treat the water, with no end date.

That pattern has repeated for over a century. When an industry pays its costs up front, it carries them. When it waits, the bill grows, and the public pays it.

AI companies are at that moment now. Your industry draws on two resources that can be hollowed out.

The first is physical. Data centers draw heavily on local water, electricity, and land. Communities are noticing. In September 2026, Frederick County, Maryland, rejected a data center developer's offer of more than $110 million in community benefits and extended its pause on new projects. Communities that feel unheard don't just negotiate. They say no.

The second is cultural.…