The data on Virginia Data Centers, Coming your way soon

The State of Virginia houses more data centers than any other market (including whole countries) in the world. 586 centers are currently operational but plans for what seems to be an unlimited number with little restrictions are in the works. The new AI push is to build data centers everywhere and anywhere resources can be found to be gobbled up to support them. Our own governor put corporate needs before citizen concerns by stopping a state level non-partisan reform bill that was to FINALLY regulate data centers. Leaving it up to each county to define their own playing rules, if any.

Data centers have become the modern day gold rush as counties reap revenue that seems to be too good to be true. Hosting companies such as Google, Amazon, Facebook, Microsoft, Apple, Digital Realty, and Iron Mountain. Loudoun County is the leader in the state with 300 data centers with 49,000,000 square feet under roof. Loudoun County is just now getting around to restrictions, referring to centers as the Goose that lays the Golden Egg.

It was interesting to me that on a chat group, someone suggested to turn a vacant mall into a data center. That's a fine idea but the modern day data center is frequently massive, dwarfing most malls. The Loudoun county "eco-center" (as our governor refers to Virginia data centers), encompasses an area of 8 pentagons (referred to as a digital city hiding in plain site).

One example is what is becoming a blossoming eco-complex that started with 2 Amazon data centers in Louisa county. Just last week, before the data centers have even been built, Amazon announced the desire to add another data center. In Louisa there are currently 4 proposed data center campuses encompassing 2,600 acres. To look at this another way, this is 1,970 football fields in size. 

Data centers run 24/7 and require massive amounts of electricity and water to cool equipment. Using Louisa as an example, as it happens to be located in the next county over from where I live, Dominion Energy owns the 2 Lake Anna nuclear reactors and will be upgrading that facility to handle electricity for the proposed data center campuses. Water will be routed from the local reservoir that is an active fishing and recreation area that currently is the primary water sources for that county.

A recent study found the data center industry both helps and hurts Virginia. There is no light at the end of the tunnel for data center development in our state which puts a lot of pressure on natural resources and electricity generation. Serious ramping up of all forms of energy production will have to happen to support the growing demand.

This year Dominion Energy is asking for a rate hike that would increase your monthly bill by an average of $21 by 2027. In 2022, the utility delivered 36% of all power to customers by natural gas, 29% by nuclear, 22% by third party purchase, 5% by coal, and 5% from renewables. Their long-term plan to meet the demand is to get energy from every basket available but natural gas, coal, and nuclear plants are main sources of energy. In Albemarle County, Dominion Energy is building a solar farm on our capped Ivy landfill which is a great way to utilize land that can't be used for much of anything else but it is a drop in the bucket.

Why have data centers become problematic. Mainly because they convert massive expanses of land and use vast amounts of resources (electricity and water) and are not good neighbors (noise, light and air pollution, and create hazardous ewaste). Community planners have created electric and water resources based on consumption by residential customers and much smaller business footprints. How close is too close to living beside a data center and what does it do to property values? 1/3 of all data centers in Virginia are near to residential areas. What is the lasting impact to quality of life? I would imagine the answer to the last 2 questions is obvious - NOT GOOD. Given data centers are spreading in our state faster than they can be regulated or even mapped, this should cause serious concern to each and every citizen. Albemarle county where I live is currently revising their data center ordinances. 

Putting greed over community sensibilities and regulations can end up being destructive. Without guardrails and community discourse the goose may leave unsuspecting citizens holding a rotten egg. 

~Rebecca