Kentucky has become the latest state to see legislation introduced to create a new electricity rate class for large load data centers.

KY HB544 was introduced to the Kentucky House of Representatives earlier this month and, if passed, would establish a range of new regulations for retail electric suppliers serving large data centers.

Sponsored by representatives Adam Moore and William Lawrence, the bill would prohibit utility companies from serving a data center customer with a total aggregated contract capacity exceeding 100MW unless the Public Service Commission (PSC) approves a specific tariff that includes minimum requirements like contract durations, early termination fees, load ramp period terms, and financial assurances from the data center.

Operational data centers with a capacity of more than 100MW would be exempt from the rules, although any expansion beyond existing load would be subject to them.

In addition, the PSC will be prohibited from approving any such tariff unless it can be demonstrated that all costs for new infrastructure built solely for the data center are borne by the data center customer, preventing cost shifting onto other customer classes.

The bill is currently moving through the House and is at the committee phase. If passed in the House, it would move to the state Senate for approval.

The bill is the latest in a series across the US that seeks to insulate other ratepayers from footing the bill for generation and transmission infrastructure required to power the data center sector.

Ohio was one of the first states to pass legislation to this effect, with the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio (PUCO) approving a new rate class in July. It requires new data center customers in Ohio to pay for a portion of their energy requests, even if they use less, to cover the cost of the infrastructure required to bring electricity to those facilities.

Following this, in September, Virginia’s main utility Dominion Energy proposed a new rate class for data centers, applying to utility customers who consume more than 25MW of energy and have a monthly load factor of more than 75 percent.

In January, Wisconsin joined the party, with the Wisconsin State Assembly passing a bill that would set out several protections for ratepayers.

Earlier this month, California saw a new bill introduced in the Senate that would require the Public Utilities Commission to establish a special rate structure for large-scale energy users, with a capacity of at least 75MW.