Rapid growth in artificial intelligence and cloud-based services has accelerated data center development, creating new pressures on electricity systems, water resources, land use, and local governance. Largely ignored by citizens and policymakers in the past, data centers are now highly visible, energy-intensive facilities whose siting and operation raise significant community and policy challenges. Yet existing research remains fragmented across technical and disciplinary silos, limiting its usefulness for decision-makers. Employing an integrative literature review methodology, this paper synthesizes interdisciplinary scholarship to examine how data center facility types, siting criteria, and operational demands translate into localized impacts on energy infrastructure, environmental systems, and public finances. It highlights how rapid industry evolution, limited transparency, and uneven regulatory capacity complicate oversight at the municipal and state levels. Drawing on infrastructure and governance theory, the paper reframes data centers as critical energy infrastructure sitting at the intersection of public and private interests, and proposes a conceptual framework to support anticipatory planning, transparency, and coordinated governance as AI-driven demand continues to grow.

Unconventional natural gas extraction presents numerous opportunities and risks for communities across the United States. To capture a portion of the revenue generated by the resource states tax unconventional natural gas development. While most states collect revenue via severance taxes, Pennsylvania took a novel approach and established an impact fee on the industry instead. Unlike severance taxes in other states, the fee is collected annually and distributed directly to municipalities. While reports show that municipalities use the funds to pay for critical infrastructure, no best practices on how to allocate the funds exist. Citing the literature on mineral resource extraction and infrastructure-led development in American communities, this study examined impact fee payments made to counties with unconventional natural gas wells. The study evaluated whether counties that used the funds to invest in infrastructure were better off in terms of employment and income than other shale-producing counties that did not. Panel fixed- and random-effects regressions suggested that no statistically significant employment or income effects existed. The results suggest that local infrastructural investments are not a successful way to overcome the resource curse issues identified in the literature.

While numerous studies have addressed the impact of unconventional natural gas development on communities in the United States during the initial boom period (2007 to 2014), few works synthesizing local governance issues exist. This paper aims to address the gap in the research by reviewing the literature and identifying challenges local governments encountered while attempting to govern the burgeoning industry. After conducting an integrative literature review of 43 studies, the author contends that the industry’s newness, regulatory confusion, information asymmetries, distrust of producers, conflicting interests, and ambiguous costs and benefits of extraction hindered local governments and their ability to address the industry and its impacts. The paper suggests that local officials should adopt collaborative frameworks to exchange information, establish best practices, and clarify regulatory landscapes. This study adds to the literature on local governance in communities with mineral resource extraction and provides insights for future industries or resources with local impacts.

This study investigates participation patterns in publicly accessible educational events organized by a college policy and research center. These programs, which addressed topics related to energy and sustainability, were conducted both online and in person and featured expert speakers from government, business, and nonprofit sectors. By analyzing registration data from over 1400 participants across multiple events, the study identifies key trends in attendance, including sector affiliation, repeat attendance, and the impact of regional relevance on program popularity. The findings indicate that most participants were private citizens or affiliated with the business sector, with lower attendance rates from academia, government, and nonprofit sectors. Furthermore, the study underscores the popularity of regionally pertinent topics and the challenges in attracting participants to more specialized topics. The research highlights the importance of providing low-barrier, accessible adult environmental education (AEE) opportunities. It suggests that colleges and universities, with organizational capabilities and access to expert speakers, are uniquely positioned to offer these programs. This study contributes to the limited quantitative research on AEE, addressing a gap in understanding participation patterns and engagement within the field.

In the United States, public schools play numerous roles in the communities in which they are located. They offer spaces for students to learn, host public events, serve as polling stations during ...