San Francisco's Board of Supervisors voted unanimously on October 6 and 7, 2026, to impose a 45-day interim zoning moratorium halting new data center approvals and expansions while the Planning Department studies energy, water, noise and pollution impacts.

Supervisor Shamann Walton introduced the measure with co-sponsorship from Supervisors Connie Chan, Jackie Fielder and Chyanne Chen. The board adopted it without dissent across the two-day session, and the interim controls took effect immediately.

For 45 days, the city will not issue permits for new data centers or for expansions of facilities already in operation. Existing sites continue to run. The pause covers approval and build-out activity only; running infrastructure is untouched.

Why did supervisors move now?

Federal projections cited in the board's record suggest U.S. data center electricity demand could triple by 2028. The Planning Code's existing definition of a data center dates to 2001 and predates the load profile of modern compute facilities, supervisors argued, leaving the city without rules calibrated for the scale of operators now applying to build.

Walton's district carries direct exposure. At least two data centers already operate in the Bayview neighborhood he represents, with additional expansions proposed there. The supervisors' concerns track a familiar list — energy use, water consumption, noise and pollution — and land hardest in neighborhoods already carrying heavy environmental burdens.

The moratorium carries a binding follow-on. The Planning Department must deliver its findings within 25 days of the moratorium taking effect, roughly three weeks before the pause itself expires. That report will shape whether supervisors extend the controls, modify them or let them lapse, and it could lay the groundwork for a longer-term ban.

Where does this leave the Bay Area?

San Francisco joins a string of Northern California cities wrestling with data center siting. Monterey Park adopted a permanent ban on data centers in May 2026, an outcome the San Francisco measure does not automatically produce but does not foreclose.

Closer in, Oakland and Hayward have put forward their own moratorium proposals and planning reviews. If those advance, the Bay Area could end up with a city-by-city patchwork of rules that hyperscale and colocation operators must work through permit by permit.

What's next for operators and developers?

Two dates anchor the window. The Planning Department's report lands within 25 days; the moratorium itself expires 20 days after that. What the planners recommend will signal whether San Francisco rewrites its 2001-era definition and reopens for business or follows Monterey Park toward an outright prohibition.

For developers already in pre-construction or expansion talks with the Planning Department, the practical effect is immediate: no new entitlements for 45 days, and a planning record that, after this fall's report, may impose new conditions on anything that follows. Until the moratorium expires or is extended, San Francisco's permitting pipeline for compute infrastructure is closed.