New Mexico DOJ files support for Project Jupiter permit petitions

SANTA TERESA, N.M. (KVIA) -- New Mexico Attorney General Raul Torrez announced Thursday that the state Department of Justice filed responses supporting two emergency petitions before the state Supreme Court. NMDOJ argued that state agencies cut corners on legally required processes to accommodate the Project Jupiter data center.

Project Jupiter is a large-scale artificial intelligence data center in development in Doña Ana County.

Water Case (Center for Biological Diversity v. Anderson)

According to Attorney General Torrez, the NMDOJ filed a response supporting an emergency writ of mandamus against State Engineer Elizabeth Anderson. The petition challenged the Office of the State Engineer's (OSE) two-day approval of an application that allowed a water well to supply construction water for the data center.

The NMDOJ alleged the approval allowed Santa Teresa Capital, LLC to repurpose and existing well without the notice and hearing New Mexico law requires.

In the filing, NMDOJ argued that the State Engineer lacks the authority to approve without notice and hearing. It said the water code's emergency exception only applies to "a genuine emergency threatening crop loss or serious economic loss to an existing use."

Attorney General Torrez said the OSE ignored its own guidance on what qualifies as an emergency and disregarded previous hearing decisions rejected similar claims of economic loss.

Additionally, he said the OSE failed to schedule a hearing on the petitioner's protest, filed Jan. 9, for nearly 10 months. The attorney general claimed the OSE denied the petitioner any hearing while a meter allegedly showed the well pumped more than 100 million gallons of groundwater from the Lower Rio Grande Basin.

Torrez said the basin faces severe drought and is subject to New Mexico's Rio Grande Compact obligations to Texas.

Air Case (New Energy Economy v. Kenney)

The NMDOJ filed a response supporting an emergency request to stay for prohibitory mandamus in a New Mexico Environment Department (NMED) air quality permitting matter for Project Jupiter's proposed power plant.

Torrez claimed the proposed power plant uses methane-fueled cells that would generate "an unprecedented concentration of this technology anywhere in the world."

According to the NMDOJ, the NMED hearing officer set a hearing date for Oct. 19 and rejected the applicant's request to accelerate it. The hearing officer allegedly said the case's complexity and due process concerns prevented the acceleration.

On July 19, the hearing officer moved the hearing to Sept. 14 and advanced the deadline for technical evidence and expert testimony from Oct. 1 to Aug. 24.

The hearing officer allegedly denied discovery entirely on Aug. 12, less than two weeks before the evidence was due, NMDOJ said.

NMDOJ argued that the Air Quality Control Act didn't require the timeline to change.