Virginie-Western is joined probe on complaints of renewable energies of technological companies

Virginia-Western Prosecutor General John “JB” McCuskey said on Monday that his office was helping to lead a new multi-state investigation into large technological companies, alleging that they are exaggerating their own energy commitments-a practice known as “Greenwashing”.

McCuskey joins 15 other state -of -the -art prosecutors, led by Austin Knudsen du Montana, by probing Tech Titans Amazon, Google, Meta and Microsoft on the assertions that they are entirely supplied by renewable energies. He said that these statements were misleading because companies are counting on renewable energy certificates – credits that allow them to claim green energy consumption even if their data centers consume electricity generated by coal and natural gas.

“What is happening is that the left has created this type of scam system,” McCuskey told Fox News Digital. “You can kill electricity in your data center using coal or natural gas, then buy credits from someone who produced green energy elsewhere and say that you do not use any fuel,” he said.

“It would be like Taylor Swift flying to the Super Bowl on his jet, then saying that she did not burn fuel to throw because she bought a carbon credit.”

Burgum, Zeldin, Wright: this is how America will reach the domination of energy

Virginia-Western Public Prosecutor John “JB” McCuskey said “greenwashing” was harmful to states. A coal-fired power plant, belonging to Dominion Energy, is seen in Mount Storm, in Virginia-Western, June 30, 2025. (Ulysse Bellier / AFP / Getty Images)

McCuskey said that practice deforms the energy market and threatens the reliability of the network, especially in states such as Virginia-Western and Montana which produce coal and natural gas. He warned that “voodoo accounting” in the credit system makes it difficult for public services and planners to know how much Electricity is really generated and consumed.

Amazon, Google and Meta did not immediately respond to the request for comments from Fox News Digital. Microsoft refused to comment.

Why the AI ​​brings up summer electricity bills

Although the letter of the coalition is critical of the system, McCuskey stressed that the intention was not to attack the technological companies themselves.

“Our beef is not really with technological companies, it is with the system that they are forced to use,” he said. “We want to establish great relationships with them because we understand how important AI and data centers are for economic development.”

Data centers like this in Abilene, Texas, require massive quantities of electricity to supply and cool thousands of servers performing artificial intelligence systems. (Kyle Grillot / Bloomberg / Getty images)

He blamed what he described as “hyper-aggressive and irrational energy policies” for strengthening the current credit system, which, according to him, began under the Obama administration and accelerated under former president Joe Biden.

McCuskey said he was the only state prosecutor to attend the recent Pittsburgh energy conference, where the president Donald Trump underlined his push to make us domination in energy and artificial intelligence A cornerstone of its economic and national security program.

Trump, McCormick to reveal $ 90 billion in energy and innovation investment in Pennsylvania

President Donald Trump announced $ 90 billion in private sector investments for energy and artificial intelligence at the inaugural summit of Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh on July 15, 2025. (Brian Kaiser / Bloomberg / Getty Images)

“What the president calls” green scam “is a very precise evaluation,” said McCuskey. “This survey is perfectly aligned with the objective of developing our carbon fuel in a way that keeps America at the top of the world in energy production and maintains affordable electricity for families.”

Click here to obtain the Fox News app

He said that Virginia-Western had not yet received a response from the companies involved, but he expects the process to take time.

“It is a question of allowing them to do what they should do without having to jump through irrational hoops,” said McCuskey. “These environmental gadgets make it more difficult for states like ours to produce the energy that the country needs and to plan a demand for future power.”