Grow the Future - a network of green voices promotes the next generation of progressive voices in Germany by offering exceptional opportunities for international learning and dialogue on urgent policy challenges. It aims to create a network of promising young activists and professionals who are leading movements and initiatives to tackle the biggest challenges of our time—from fighting climate change, to protecting human rights and open societies, to ensuring a sustainable future for the next generation. We achieve this by bringing together groups working to create change in two of our topic areas on a study tour to the US in the spring or early summer and hosting an alumni meeting at the Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung Headquarters in Berlin in the fall.

In 2026, Grow the Future will bring an interdisciplinary group of German officials and experts to the US to examine the emerging politics of data center activism. Companies are investing tens of billions of dollars in hyperscale data centers that place new strains on climate goals and require unprecedented amounts of water, land, and energy. A parallel boom is reshaping Europe as rapid AI deployment converges with growing demands for sovereign control over critical digital infrastructure.

The latest generation of AI data centers – with names like Stargate, Prometheus, Hyperion, and Colossus – is already transforming local communities and ecosystems. With limited public policy frameworks in place to govern responsible growth, data center expansion is becoming a significant political issue ahead of the US midterm congressional elections later this year. Environmental justice groups and community advocates are elevating concerns around climate impacts, water use, public health, social equity, Indigenous rights, and corporate power. Their efforts have had tangible effects: in 2025 alone, grassroots campaigns contributed to the cancellation of dozens of proposed data centers representing billions of dollars in investment, even as overall construction is expected to continue at a rapid pace in 2026.

Grow the Future participants will travel to Arizona and California to meet policymakers, Indigenous leaders, and experts on technology, land, water, and energy to examine how local activism has responded to the explosive growth of data centers in the US. In Northern California, they will meet with progressive activist groups, state lawmakers, and tech companies with alternative visions for the rollout of AI and other resource intensive technologies. In Arizona, participants will engage directly with Indigenous communities, state agencies, utilities, and environmental justice and youth groups in one of North America’s fastest-growing data center regions, where water scarcity, grid expansion, and digital infrastructure have become central political and environmental challenges.

Applications are due by Monday, March 16, 2026 at 5:59pm ET.

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In 2025, Grow the Future brought an interdisciplinary group of political campaigners, activists, influencers, educators, journalists, researchers, and policymakers to Canada to explore initiatives and ideas to improve the digital ecosystem to empower humans and protect their rights. Participants traveled to Canada with experts from the Heinrich Böll Foundation from October 5 - 11, 2025 to meet partners working on the threats that democratic societies face from the Big Tech oligarchy and foreign actors who exploit digital technologies to undermine civic discourse.

Previous Grow the Future Tours