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Worries over water as a giant data center moves into the New Mexico desert

A county in the New Mexico borderlands desperate for economic development has OK'd one of the country's biggest data centers, with its own gas-fired electricity plant. There's now some buyer's remorse.

Copyright 2026 NPR

As NPR's Southwest correspondent based in Austin, Texas, John Burnett covers immigration, border affairs, Texas news and other national assignments. In 2018, 2019 and again in 2020, he won national Edward R. Murrow Awards from the Radio-Television News Directors Association for continuing coverage of the immigration beat. In 2020, Burnett along with other NPR journalists, were finalists for a duPont-Columbia Award for their coverage of the Trump Administration's Remain in Mexico program. In December 2018, Burnett was invited to participate in a workshop on Refugees, Immigration and Border Security in Western Europe, sponsored by the RIAS Berlin Commission.