From Data Center YIMBY to NIMBY?
A growing number of states and towns are tightening incentives and regulating growth.
Over the last decade, state and local governments have welcomed data centers with open arms by creating massive subsidies and tax incentives for them. According to NAIOP, 36 states currently offer incentives for data centers as a way of boosting their economies and increasing their tax bases.
But a recent surge in data center development to meet the ever-growing demand for capacity is putting a strain on power supply and infrastructure, causing some jurisdictions to question the benefits of these projects and the stimulus packages they’ve been offering. Some are even passing legislation designed to slow down the frenetic pace of development.
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The lure of data centers
Major data center hubs—such as Northern Virginia, the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex, Atlanta, Phoenix and Chicago—owe their existence to some level of incentives and efforts by local governments to embrace data center development.
“Government support and community interest—or outright opposition—can vary greatly even within specific metros,” said Todd Smith, chief technology officer for Transwestern’s technology properties group tenant advisory practice. “You will tend to see data centers clustered in certain areas for this reason, as well as available infrastructure and utilities.”
Every state and city wants new job growth and tax-dollar injection into the local economy, commented Sean Farney, vice president of Data Center Strategy at JLL. “And data centers bring both, as hundreds of tradespeople are required to build these facilities, and data center companies spend hundreds of millions of dollars during the build cycle,” he said.
Farney contended that states with pro-data center policies that streamline the build and procurement process have thrived. For example, Illinois attracted billions of dollars of investment after successfully crafting a set of tax incentives for data center development. Iowa adopted a state-wide renewable energy policy some years ago, which ended up attracting billions of dollars in data center investment funding, with Microsoft and Google both establishing large hubs there, he continued.
In Northern Virginia, which has the capacity to provide abundant power for more than a decade, local governments appointed officials to head data center development coordination efforts, Farney noted, and ”the industry loved having a cooperative partner.”
To accommodate developers, San Antonio provided a low-cost cooling system for data centers using gray water.
Data center boom sets off alarm bells
Data centers worldwide already consume about 4 percent of the world’s electricity, according to a report from Data Center Knowledge. Usage by U.S. data centers is expected to triple by 2028, accounting for up to 12 percent of the nation’s power usage.
In addition to concerns about energy and water consumption, state and local governments also worry that the increased demand could jeopardize their carbon dioxide reduction goals by potentially forcing utilities to increase dependence on fossil fuels.
A 2016 study by Good Jobs First, a nonprofit watchdog group that tracks economic development incentives, found that nationwide, data center subsidies were costing state and local governments about $2 million per job created, a figure the report’s author, Kasia Tarczynska, said has ballooned in recent years.
As a result, state incentives may come with requirements, such as job-creation thresholds. In Nevada, for example, to qualify for a 10-year tax abatement, a data center must create 10 new jobs, and a 20-year abatement requires 50 jobs. Some states also require that jobs created cannot be subject to workforce reductions for a specific time period.
To create goodwill among city leaders and residents, data center developers will throw in some amenities at their expense. “Oftentimes, a developer will directly contribute locally by building a new water main, establishing new parks, providing technology education and training, and even donating software,” Farney said, noting that in municipalities with limited natural resources like water, data center operators have designed low- or no-water facilities.
New regulations may slow development
The backlash over energy usage and other concerns has also prompted state and local governments to implement new data-center-specific regulations and zoning changes or pull the plug on incentives to slow or limit new development.
Last month, for example, the Virginia State Senate passed a bill that requires data center permit applicants to provide a study of the project’s impact on water, agriculture, parks, registered historic sites and land where the data center would be located. If located within 500 feet of a school or in a residential area, the applicant must provide a detailed profile of the project’s design and impact on its neighbors.
The state’s lawmakers also have proposed bills that would limit any construction or infrastructure costs from being passed on to consumers and offer tax credits to commercial facilities that meet certain energy efficiency standards.
Two communities in Northern Virginia have also responded to resident complaints about the size of and noise from data centers. Prince William County increased its tax rate on the equipment inside data centers by 72 percent. Neighboring Loudoun County made all data center projects subject to review by the county board, a move to keep these projects away from residential areas and certain commercial zones. Additionally, Fairfax County recently banned data centers within a mile of rail stations.
Arizona, Illinois and Arkansas officials have passed laws to either suspend data center development or further restrict where they can be built, reported Stateline. As part of a broader energy bill, South Carolina lawmakers concerned about rising electricity demand are considering pulling the plug on discounted power rates for data centers.
Bills under consideration in Georgia, California and Virginia would place more of the costs for improving data center infrastructure on developers rather than being borne by taxpayers, according to Politico’s E&E News.
It also reported that Texas lawmakers are considering a bill that would raise power costs for data centers and potentially force them to power off during a grid emergency. This legislation was proposed in response to power regulators warning that the Electric Reliability Council of Texas grid will need to double its power generation capacity by 2030 to meet booming demand.
Additionally, Georgia passed legislation that placed a two-year moratorium on tax incentives allotted to data centers, but it was vetoed by Gov. Brian Kemp at the urging of the Data Center Coalition, a trade group representing tech giants, including Amazon, Google and Meta.
The Atlanta City Council, however, recently banned data center development in the CBD near transit hubs and the Beltline, citing a need to prioritize housing, retail and public spaces. This action canceled a 300,000-square-foot data center development proposed near the Five Points MARTA rail station and Underground Atlanta.
Data center developers and investors sometimes face challenges in certain regions of the country, particularly near population centers where there is competition for limited available land, noted David Ferdman, managing director at Primary Digital Infrastructure, which provides flexible financing solutions for data centers.
“By leveraging the existing (asset) surroundings, data center developers can (often) address key challenges related to electricity, water and competition for land, while ensuring that the facilities are positioned for sustainable growth,” he said.
Federal deregulation to benefit data centers
While some markets like Northern Virginia are pulling back support for more data center development, Smith said, markets like Texas and Alberta are embracing more investment in this sector, including the enablement of major natural gas production.
Smith noted that use of natural gas, which does include some level of carbon emissions, is paramount in meeting growing power demand. Support from the Trump Administration in the form of relaxed rules around emissions will also be useful in bringing new projects online.
President Donald Trump has already announced that Damac Properties, which is controlled by Emirati billionaire Hussain Sajwani, will invest $20 billion in data center development across a number of states, including Texas, Arizona, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Ohio, Illinois, Michigan and Indiana.
Smith noted that public or private support for co-locating energy generation on-site will be helpful in both reducing the strain on public power grids and CO2 emissions targets.
In an effort to support AI development, President Joe Biden opened federal lands to data center developers and offered them expedited permitting. But this was a nonstarter, Farney said, because the opportunity to develop on federal lands is contingent on using geothermal energy, a technology that does not scale to the commonplace gigawatt campus sizes.
“The new administration’s approach is more open market, starting with the thesis that AI is strategic to U.S. interests and that leadership must be maintained via reduced constraints on digital infrastructure deployment,” Farney continued.
The Trump Administration recently announced U.S. government investment in a $500 billion public/private alliance called Stargate. Touted as a means to secure America’s AI future, this joint venture—which is backed by OpenAI, Oracle and investors SoftBank and MGX—was formed to build advanced data centers across Texas and beyond. It comes with an initial $100 billion commitment and brings together a collaboration key technology partners, including ARM, Microsoft and NVIDIA.
Big tech takes action to thwart more regulation
To overcome regulatory challenges, data center developers and hyperscalers—including Microsoft, Amazon, Oracle, Google and Meta—are increasingly co-locating privately owned power production facilities on-site or near data centers. They are also stepping up their move to nuclear energy to meet their own ESG goals, which Farney noted are often are more stringent than government mandates.
Microsoft, for example, is repositioning Pennsylvania’s Three Mile Island defunct nuclear reactor to meet its power requirements in that region, while other Big Tech users are embracing small modular reactors, a new technology that will co-locate small, privately operated nuclear reactors on data center sites.
Despite the growing pains being felt by data center companies and jurisdictions, Farney believes that data centers maintain their appeal.
“If data is the currency of the 21st century, then data centers are the banks protecting this valuable commodity,” Farney commented. “When you look at the positives—increased tax revenues, more jobs, training programs, lower utility rates due to subsidies, improved infrastructure, and better-performing digital services—it’s hard (for local governments) not to like data centers.”
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