HomeMy WebLinkAbout08 17 2026 - Item 9.2 - Mila Bekele1
Stefan Mercer
From:Mila B. <mandmbekele@gmail.com>
Sent:Monday, August 17, 2026 2:12 PM
To:Public Comments
Subject:EXTERNAL - Public Comment on Agenda Section 9 Item 2: Amazon Data Services
Reimbursement Agreement for Recycled Water Improvements
Dear Mayor and City Council,
I am a public health student and resident of San Jose, and I am writing regarding Section 9 Item 2:
Amazon Data Services Reimbursement Agreement for Recycled Water Improvements and
Memorandum of Understanding with South County Regional Wastewater Authority. The decisions
regarding the Amazon data center before the council today have implications for our entire region.
I share many residents’ deep concerns on multiple fronts. First is on public input. City documents
make clear that this permit was approved without public involvement, on the basis of it fitting within
existing zoning. However, this data center introduces energy demands, greenhouse gas emissions,
potable water requirements, fire hazard, and potential toxins introduced to municipal wastewater
treatment. The scale of this development and these costs to residents and the surrounding
environment should be matters of transparent, public decisionmaking.
A particular public health impact of this development is air pollution. While Amazon’s report
downplays greenhouse gas emissions, the permit makes clear that 27 diesel generators would be
running on site. The city points to the air quality management district’s 50 hours per year limit on
running diesel generators. But is the city truly prepared to shut down generator use, knowing that
doing so would impact the data center’s ability to operate and profit? Municipalities nationwide have
been failing to enforce their own air quality regulations. Additionally, Amazon’s air quality report
downplays the significance of GHG emissions by pointing to "mitigation" of essentially all CO2
pollution. However, mitigation is almost always a lie - these emissions will still be released into the
atmosphere, pushing us deeper into a climate crisis that is already bringing wildfires and drought to
our region. Air pollution impacts should be reevaluated, with only unmitigated figures used to define
significance.
Finally, city documents make little mention of the cooling technology this data c enter proposes to use,
or how the city will deal with waste. In order to use recycled water, data centers must use toxic anti-
corrosives, which are concentrated into “blowdown” that must eventually exit the system. This
includes PFAS, forever chemicals municipal water systems are unequipped to process. Particularly
given how secretive data center developers have been with the makeup of their wastewater, this poses
great risk to the purity of our region’s critical groundwater.
In Gilroy, as in San Jose, the public’s voice should be the guide on new developments, particularly
when they introduce such profound environmental and social risk. I implore you to revise this
development plan to include the community input that has so far been ignored.
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Sincerely,
Mila