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IACHR Warns: AI Data Centers May Impact Human Rights

Data centers for artificial intelligence pose direct and indirect risks to human rights, especially the economic, social, cultural, and environmental rights of local populations. The Special Rapporteurship on Economic, Social, Cultural, and Environmental Rights (REDESCA) of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) has acknowledged this. It has expressed concern over the intensive use of water and energy by digital infrastructures. Furthermore, it reaffirms that technological development and environmental and climate protection are not mutually exclusive. They are complementary aspects of a development model that respects human rights.

The Special Rapporteur’s statement is especially significant because, for the first time, this regional body has addressed the socio-environmental impacts of data centers. The statement responds to a December 2025 request for a public hearing, submitted by a group of organizations and social leaders seeking official recognition of these concerns. These include the Latin American Institute of Terraforming, the Brazilian Laboratory for Public Policy and the Internet (LAPIN), Chief Roberto Ytaysaba Anacé, Idec (Brazilian Institute for Consumer Protection), the Recife Institute for Research on Law and Technology (IP.rec), the Terramar Institute, ISOC Colombia, and the Green Screen Coalition.

Specifically, REDESCA highlights four very important points. This is particularly relevant in light of the growing push toward deregulation (or, quite simply, the absence of specific regulations) and the imposition of dubious or nonexistent mechanisms for citizen participation regarding environmental assessments of new data center projects in our countries:

• “The importance of States adopting regulatory frameworks and public policies to ensure that digital transformation advances with a human rights-based approach, environmental sustainability, and corporate due diligence, in line with Inter-American standards on business and human rights. This entails ensuring environmental and climate impact assessments processes, access to information, effective community participation, and measures aimed at advancing the energy transition.”

• “Given the scale and pace of the expansion of digital infrastructure in the Americas -particularly resource-intensive infrastructure that underpins artificial intelligence- States must adopt immediate and differentiated regulatory measures to address structural risks to human rights, the environment, and the climate.” In this regard, at the Latin American Institute for Terraforming, through our DataCenterBoom! project, we believe it is of the utmost importance that REDESCA state that the enhanced duty of prevention required by Inter-American standards is undermined when the State approves large-scale projects “without specific regulatory frameworks and without integrated assessments of cumulative impacts”—which is exactly what is happening in Latin America.

• “The deployment of new digital infrastructure that is intensive in water and energy must be conditioned on strict legal safeguards, and States should consider temporary moratorium on the granting of new permits or approvals, with full respect for due process, where there are serious and foreseeable risks to the rights to water, a healthy environment, health, and dignified living conditions.”

• Likewise, REDESCA recalls “States’ obligation to ensure timely, accessible, and understandable public access to environmental information -including data on water and energy consumption -meaningful community participation, and access to effective mechanisms of environmental justice, in accordance with the corpus iuris of the Inter-American Human Rights System.”

The full REDESCA statement can be found here.

*Illustration by Jake Stevens | BBJ

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