group of Amazon Engineers appeared at a Seattle City Council hearing on Wednesday to support efforts to regulate the development of giant AI data centers in the region, which are being built while employers are conducting mass layoffs.
“Amazon is reportedly spending $200 billion in capital this year, most of it going to data centers and AI,” Patrick Schlosser, a software engineer at Amazon Web Services, said at the hearing. “Microsoft is spending $190 billion. Meanwhile, leaders at my company have laid off 30,000 employees in the past eight months. What this tells us is that big tech companies are desperate to build as much computing power as possible as quickly as possible.”
An Amazon spokesperson told CNBC in a statement that the company respects the right of its colleagues to express their opinions.
Seattle city officials have voted to approve a one-year moratorium on construction of new large-scale artificial intelligence data centers to give the city time to regulate the project. The proposal comes after four developers approached local power companies about building five large-scale facilities in Seattle. Two of those developers later withdrew their proposals after public backlash, the Seattle Times reported.
“At this time, we have no plans to build a data center within the Seattle area,” an Amazon spokesperson said. “Across the communities where we operate our data centers, we are committed to being a responsible neighbor, investing in local economic development while prioritizing water and energy efficiency that exceeds industry standards.”
Seattle joins a growing list of cities and counties seeking to put limits on the explosive growth of AI data centers. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, 14 states are considering legislation that would suspend or ban new data centers. A report from Data Center Watch found that in 2025, at least $156 billion in data center projects were blocked or delayed due to local opposition and litigation.
Tech companies’ hyperscalers show no signs of slowing down.
Amazon, microsoftGoogle’s parent alphabetand meta is spending about $700 billion in capital spending this year, primarily on AI infrastructure. At the same time, tech giants and other companies in the industry are looking for ways to cut costs, including by cutting jobs.
The 30,000 job cuts Schlesser cited at Amazon, all of which have taken place since October, are part of Chief Executive Officer Andy Jassy’s efforts to remove layers and reduce bureaucracy so he can run the company like what he calls “the world’s largest startup.”
In February, Amazon announced plans to spend $200 billion in capital spending this year, with the bulk of it going to AI infrastructure. This outlook was reaffirmed in April.
Schlesser, who has worked at Amazon for nearly six years, called on Seattle officials to require data center developers to commit to using renewable energy to power their facilities and to avoid non-disclosure agreements or shell companies when announcing new projects.
“We have to provide good jobs to build these things, and every time we make a major layoff, we have to pay new taxes to fund city jobs,” Schlesser said.
Amazon said it continues to reevaluate the way it operates its data centers, including powering them with carbon-free energy and improving energy efficiency. The company also said it aims to return more water to local communities than it uses in its data centers by 2030.
Schlesser and two other Amazon engineers who spoke at the hearing, Liesl Wigand and Darius Irani, are part of Amazon Employees for Climate Justice. A group of current and former Amazon employees has repeatedly pressed the e-tailer on its stance on climate change, employee treatment and other issues.
In November, the group sent a letter to Amazon executives urging the company to establish a “more responsible deployment of AI” and “get real about the costs of AI and the guardrails needed.”
Wigand, who has worked at Amazon for more than 12 years, characterized Amazon’s efforts to deploy the technology as “building AI that is justified at every cost.”
“The biggest problem is the belief that AI should be the answer to everything, ignoring costly resources,” Wigand said. “This culture is ubiquitous across technology, which is why local governments need to work with local stakeholders to set the conditions for data center construction.”
The one-year moratorium was approved unanimously Wednesday by the Legislature’s Land Use and Sustainability Committee.
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