How the card networks are managing data center pressure

• Key insights: Visa and Mastercard are embedding data center strategy into broader environmental initiatives.
• What's at stake: Data centers are growing as AI becomes more popular, drawing on local resources.
• Forward look: Payment experts say it's vital to have a data strategy despite the political pressure. 

With data centers drawing controversy over environmental impacts, payment companies face the challenge of staying competitive in the artificial intelligence race while minimizing exposure to public pressure.

Visa and Mastercard, two of the world's largest payment companies, say they have included the impact of data centers in their overall environmental, social and governance frameworks. Visa and Mastercard are reporting greenhouse gas emissions on a yearly basis and have set carbon reduction goals.

These goals cover numerous activities such as office footprints, supply chains and the impact plastic payment cards have on the environment.

Given AI's demand for more electricity, data centers are becoming a larger part of the mix. "Where sourcing renewable energy is challenging, we invest in renewable sources to power offices and data processing facilities," Mastercard's press office said in an email.

Energizing

DitchCarbon, an energy tracking app, reports Visa and Mastercard's carbon emissions performance is better than the global payment company average, based on the companies' disclosures, compared to international card companies, cross-border fintechs and other comparable organizations.

DitchCarbon attributes Visa and Mastercard's performance to investments in virtual cards and other digital payment options. Mastercard reported "scope 1 and 2 emissions," which cover operations and purchase energy, fell 44% in 2025, passing the company's 38% target. Scope 3 emissions, which cover supply chain and purchased goods and services, fell 46% compared to a 20% target.

Visa in 2025 reported a total greenhouse gas emissions footprint of 685.3 million kilograms of carbon dioxide equivalent, covering all three scopes. In 2024, Visa reported total greenhouse gas emissions of 690.2 million kg.

"Visa is working to responsibly manage the environmental footprint of our business, which primarily includes our data centers, offices, purchased goods and services, from our suppliers, business travel, and employee commuting. Central to this, we have set targets to reduce our greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions," the card network said in a corporate responsibility document emailed to American Banker.

In an email, Mastercard's media office said, "We've set ambitious environmental sustainability targets and we are making great progress towards them," adding it has pledged to reach zero emissions by 2040.

"In the payments industry, I think there is an opportunity to build data centers in areas that have suffered from abandonment and decay, and to be generous to local communities, not just through tax revenue," Phillip Philliou, a payments industry consultant, told American Banker. As data centers become reliable, core customers of power utilities, the utilities can invest and improve, Philliou said. "Data centers are the only way, at this point in time, to ensure that payment businesses and regions remain competitive in this AI-driven environment. It's going to require a lot of sensitivity by the payment companies as the noise pollution created is apparently a real issue," Philliou said. 

How do data centers fit in?

Mastercard and Visa did not say how many data centers they operate. Mastercard has about 60 data centers, according to Fierce Network.

At Mastercard's St. Louis technology and data hub, the card network has built a solar field to support operations, and the company has made similar investments at data centers in the U.K. and Dubai.

"Our tech team has also built a real-time carbon dashboard, giving us granular energy and emissions data across our global data centers," Mastercard's press office said in an email, adding that In 2025, for the third year in a row, the company continued to see signs of decoupling growth from emissions: Revenue grew by 16% and emissions declined by 1%.

And in 2025, for the ninth consecutive year, Mastercard generated or sourced 100% of renewable energy for its operations. Visa said that as it scales its AI capabilities, the energy required to power these solutions will increase. To address this rising demand, the card network is migrating AI workloads to cloud platforms, which reduces onsite energy use and allows teams to scale computing capacity as needed.

"Our hybrid and multi-cloud approach, which combines our own infrastructure with multiple cloud providers, enables us to run AI workloads in efficient environments," Visa said in its corporate responsibility document. 

Feeling the heat

The growth of AI is fueling data center construction and public attention. There are 68 data centers under construction, with 41 proposals, according to the Brockovich Data Center, adding there are about 6,800 data centers in the U.S.

"Data centers have long relied on freshwater for cooling, but the AI boom has escalated that demand. In 2025, data centers consumed hundreds of billions of gallons of water for cooling and power generation. Developers are now tapping local rivers, aquifers, and municipal supplies at unprecedented rates to satisfy the thirst of data centers, putting the communities that host them at risk," the University of Chicago said in a research note, adding data center operations still rely heavily on fossil fuels, emitting air pollutants and fine particulates that raise serious public health risks, especially asthma. "Meanwhile, chemical runoff from cooling systems contaminates soil and waterways. These facilities create real environmental challenges and are too often sited and strategically chosen in already vulnerable places. As AI demand surges, the need for more facilities will only grow," the University of Chicago said.

The financial services industry has already seen pressure from data center opponents. Bank of Washington, a small bank in Missouri, recently received calls for a boycott as part of a larger protest against a planned data center in the region. Political pushback aside, data centers will be an attractive option in certain regions and key for payment companies to remain relevant, according to fintech experts.

Payment firms cannot afford to treat data‑center challenges as a corporate‑social‑responsibility or branding exercise, according to Eric Grover, principal at Intrepid Ventures. 

"In a highly competitive and heavily regulated market, the fight over data‑center location is fundamentally a battle over input costs, operational resilience, and regulatory risk," Grover told American Banker.

Data centers follow the same economic logic as capital, jobs, and businesses: They migrate to countries, states and towns with lower energy costs, predictable permitting regimes and stable regulatory environments, and away from those with hostile or uncertain climates, according to Grover, adding power alone can represent 30% to 50% of a data center's operating expense, making energy‑price volatility and local utility policy competitive factors.

"Likewise, multi‑year permitting delays in some U.S. states and EU jurisdictions have already pushed hyperscalers and processors to shift capacity to more favorable regions," Grover said. "For payment networks and processors, the stakes are even higher. Data center location directly affects latency, uptime and redundancy, all of which are existential in a real‑time, always‑on industry."