Lombardo Executive Order Puts Guardrails on Data Centers After Ford-Authored 2015 Giveaway

Nevada Gov. Joe Lombardo signed Executive Order 2026-005 on Sept. 17 establishing the Nevada Standard for Responsible Data Center Development, requiring developers seeking tax abatements to pay the Local School Support Tax in full, cover their own energy and infrastructure costs so ratepayers are not billed, meet local water standards, and protect grid reliability and host communities. 

The order directs the Governor’s Office of Economic Development not to advance applications unless the developer executes a binding Community Support Commitment and pays a combined sales-and-use tax rate of at least 4.6% with no abatement of the school tax or the portion going to the state general fund. It also bars projects owned or controlled by designated foreign adversaries and requires a Responsible Speed to Power Plan identifying needed generation through 2036 without shifting costs onto existing customers. 

“I promised Nevadans that data centers would be developed responsibly with the community’s interest in mind. Today, we’re delivering on that promise,” Lombardo said. “They must pay their share, protect our water resources, keep costs from being passed on to ratepayers, and protect the communities that host them.” 

His office added that Nevadans should not have to wait for the Legislature and that “waiting for the legislature to get this right is never an effective strategy.” 

The order targets gaps in the 2015 statute that created the data-center abatement program. That law, Senate Bill 170, required GOED to grant abatements to projects meeting employment, wage, and investment thresholds. It contained no protections for energy or water use and gave the board no flexibility to deny applications. 

Then-Senate Minority Leader Aaron Ford was a primary co-sponsor; the bill passed unanimously. 

This outlet documented the reversal last month in “Aaron Ford’s Sudden Data Center Outrage.” Ford, now the Democratic nominee for governor, had unveiled a campaign platform to pause new abatements, audit existing ones, ban evaporative cooling statewide, and require data centers to “bring their own water or coolant” and pay for their own electricity. 

The article highlighted the 2015 law he helped write included “ZERO guardrails on their energy or water use…The facts he now rails against were baked into the very framework he helped build.” At the time, Ford and his fellow Democrats had celebrated the incentives as a way to attract tech jobs. “

Team Lombardo weighed in on the dispute: “Aaron Ford authored the bill to give tax breaks for data centers, which included ZERO guardrails on their energy or water use. Now, Ford wants to rewrite history and lie to Nevadans.” 

In a follow-up piece, “Let Data Reign? Nevada Democrats Say No,” we highlighted Democratic efforts, including an interim committee vote led by Sen. Dina Neal, to freeze new construction and repeal the tax breaks—treating long-standing Nevada operators such as Switch the same as unbuilt projects, noting: “Nevada Democrats are trying to freeze an industry a Las Vegas company spent 26 years building.”

Ford called Lombardo’s executive order a “last-ditch excuse for an executive order that maintains the status quo” and said it “is not a reflection of what Nevada communities are asking for.” 

The governor’s office responded to the 2015 law’s lack of energy and water protections and pointed to 2025 legislative changes that already expanded GOED’s authority to deny applications, reduce abatements, or attach conditions. 

The new order uses that authority to restore school funding that abatements had diverted—estimated by one teachers union at $357 million since 2015—and to require developers to bear project costs. 

Lombardo officials have framed the policy as opening the door to responsible investment and jobs while ending an automatic subsidy that predates the current AI boom. The Community Support Commitment terms are due by Nov. 6. Data-center applications that do not meet the new minimums will not reach the GOED board.