Revealed: The Old NSA Data Center Had the Capacity to Track and Store 100 Years’ Worth of Data on Not Only Americans but Also Every Person Worldwide

For years, brave whistleblowers sounded the alarm about the U.S. government’s growing surveillance capabilities that threaten our privacy and freedom. Edward Snowden exposed the NSA’s broad bulk data collection programs (like PRISM and metadata sweeps on phone records), revealing a “collect it all” mindset that raised major alarms about government surveillance of Americans. Wikipedia – Utah Data Center

William Binney, a former NSA technical director and earlier whistleblower, was far more specific about the old NSA Utah Data Center’s capabilities in Bluffdale. Speaking in 2012-2013 about that facility (long before any new projects like Stratos existed), he estimated it could handle 5 zettabytes of data (with some references to even larger yottabyte-scale potential). In his words:

“They would have plenty of space with five zettabytes to store at least something on the order of 100 years worth of the worldwide communications, phones and emails and stuff like that.”

Binney warned the old NSA facility was built to vacuum up and store content (not just metadata) of communications for potential retroactive searching and analysis on a massive scale. He sounding the alarm that this infrastructure already enables unprecedented tracking and long-term storage of personal data from Americans and people worldwide. Skeptics Stack Exchange – Binney Quote

The old NSA center already possessed jaw-dropping capabilities to store and process vast amounts of personal communications for decades. Yet the new hyperscale AI data centers will dwarf it entirely in power and processing – potentially handling more information than humanity has ever generated or imagined before, thanks to AI-driven analysis at speeds and scales that turn “big data” into something truly unimaginable.

During the course of writing this article, intense lobbying and public pressure significantly altered the proposed Stratos AI data center I had originally planned to use as the primary example. The Stratos Project in Box Elder County, Utah, was dramatically scaled back from its original ambitions. I am therefore now comparing the revised and reduced plan to the old NSA Utah Data Center (the “Bumblehive”) in Bluffdale.

For additional perspective, below is a comparison of the old NSA Bumblehive to five of the largest hyperscale AI data centers proposed or under development in the United States (ranked roughly by announced power capacity and overall campus scale as of mid-2026).

The original plan for the Stratos Project envisioned a sprawling 40,000-acre campus in Box Elder County. That is an area larger than Manhattan and roughly the size of Washington, D.C., with up to 9 gigawatts of on-site natural gas power generation at full build-out and a projected cost of up to $100 billion. It was positioned to become one of the largest data center developments in the world, featuring dozens of massive AI-optimized buildings.

Public Pushback Forces Scaling Back

Fierce pushback from citizens in Box Elder County, environmental groups worried about impacts on the Great Salt Lake, and political leaders at the state level, including a public call from Utah Senate President J. Stuart Adams for a 75 percent reduction in the footprint, prompted the developer, Kevin O’Leary of O’Leary Digital, to scale the project back significantly in June 2026. The project area was reduced by about 20,000 acres, bringing the total project area down to roughly 20,000 acres, with the effective development footprint for buildings and infrastructure now focused on approximately 10,000 acres or less. Substantial portions of the remaining land are reserved for potential solar areas. 1

Even this scaled-back model of Stratos remains immense.

It will operate on a vastly larger scale and with far greater power and computational capacity than the old NSA Utah Data Center in Bluffdale (nicknamed Bumblehive). That facility, already operational by 2014, represented a major leap in surveillance infrastructure for its era. The new generation of AI hyperscale centers, even when trimmed by public pressure, dwarfs that capability in land area, electricity demand, data throughput, and especially in the speed and sophistication of AI-powered analysis they enable.

Old NSA Utah Data Center (Bluffdale / “Bumblehive”) vs. Scaled-Back Stratos Project (Box Elder County)

Category Old NSA Utah Data Center (Bluffdale) Scaled-Back Stratos Project (Box Elder County)

Overall Size About 1 to 1.5 million square feet total (roughly 20-30 football Focused development footprint of approximately 10,000 acres for data center

Category Old NSA Utah Data Center (Bluffdale) Scaled-Back Stratos Project (Box Elder County) fields). Only about 100,000 square feet dedicated to actual servers. Wikipedia – Utah Data Center buildings, power infrastructure, and support facilities within a reduced project area of roughly 20,000 acres after removal of about 20,000 acres of sensitive land. Salt Lake Tribune, June 4, 2026 FOX 13 News

Power Use 65 megawatts (MW) – enough to power roughly 30,000 to 65,000 average homes. Up to 7.5-9 gigawatts (7,500-9,000 MW) at full build-out in the revised plans (approximately 115 times the power of the old NSA center). [Salt Lake Tribune; FOX 13 News, June 2026]

Storage /

Compute

Capacity Estimated 3-12 exabytes, with some references to even larger yottabyte-scale potential in older claims. Focused on bulk storage of intelligence data such as emails and calls for later analysis. Skeptics Stack Exchange – Binney Quote Not publicly detailed in precise exabyte or zettabyte figures. Engineered specifically for hyperscale AI training and real-time inference workloads that require and generate vastly larger and more dynamic datasets than traditional intelligence storage facilities. The AI processing capabilities represent a fundamental escalation in analytical power.

Cost About 1.5 billion dollars to build. Wikipedia Projected in the tens of billions of dollars. (Original ambitious vision approached $100 billion.) [Stratos Project reporting]

Purpose NSA signals intelligence, cybersecurity, bulk data storage, and analysis in support of national security. Large-scale AI data centers and cloud computing infrastructure to support artificial intelligence development, with potential applications in national security and commercial sectors.

Water /

Cooling Approximately 1 million gallons or more per day for cooling systems. Water consumption remains a major local concern given the project’s location near the ecologically stressed Great Salt Lake. The developer has stated commitments to water recycling, closed-loop cooling where feasible, and potential dedication of excess water back

Category Old NSA Utah Data Center (Bluffdale) Scaled-Back Stratos Project (Box Elder County) to the lake system (subject to agreements). Full environmental reviews are pending. (Problems with closed loop water systems explained later in this article)

Status Fully operational since approximately 2014, following some early power-related delays. Revised design announced in June 2026. Key approvals were granted in May 2026 by Box Elder County and the Military Installation Development Authority (MIDA), but major construction has not started. Additional permitting and environmental analysis required. Build-out will occur in multiple phases over many years. MIDA Stratos materials; recent news reporting

Scale

Perspective A landmark government surveillance and data storage facility for the early 2010s – powerful in its time but constrained by the technology and mission of that era. Even after meaningful reductions this project stands as one of the largest planned hyperscale AI infrastructure campuses in the country. It is designed explicitly for the unprecedented data and compute demands of modern artificial intelligence and will possess capabilities that far exceed those of the previous generation of data centers in both commercial AI advancement and potential surveillance applications. Ars Technica, June 2026

Don’t Be Fooled by the Closed Water Loop System

Developers of the Stratos Project claim their closed-loop cooling system will save water by recycling the same fluid inside sealed pipes without constant refilling. While this approach does reduce overall consumption compared to traditional evaporative cooling towers, it still requires significant amounts of water. Even in a closed system, water is lost through evaporation in heat exchangers and cooling processes, especially at the massive scale of a hyperscale AI data center. In addition, the system needs regular maintenance flushes and

top-offs. A top-off means adding fresh water to replace what has been lost through evaporation or small leaks.

More concerning, operators must add chemicals such as biocides to prevent bacteria and algae growth, along with corrosion inhibitors to stop rust and wear on equipment. These toxic additives build up over time, and when the system is drained or blowdown water is released, the polluted mixture can harm local waterways, soil, and the already stressed Great Salt Lake ecosystem. Blowdown is the process of draining some of the concentrated, chemically treated water to prevent mineral and contaminant buildup, then replacing it with fresh water. What looks like a green solution on paper still demands huge volumes of water and creates real pollution risks for the surrounding community.

Comparing Bumblehive NSA Data Center to top five AI Data Centers in the United States

Old NSA Bumblehive (Bluffdale, UT) vs. each of the top five (by announced power capacity and campus scale as of mid-2026):

· Old NSA Bumblehive (Bluffdale, UT): ~65 MW power, ~1–1.5 million sq ft total site (~100k sq ft servers), ~$1.5B cost. Purpose: Bulk surveillance storage/analysis.

Picture of Bumblehive NSA data center below:

· vs. Delta Gigasite (Creekstone Energy, Millard County, Utah): >10 GW planned power (150x+ larger), 20+ million sq ft campus on thousands of acres. Positioned as potentially the world’s largest AI infrastructure site for hyperscale training/inference at unprecedented scale. Dwarfs Bumblehive in every infrastructure metric.

Stunning promotional/aerial image below of this planned >10 GW AI infrastructure campus below shows the enormous scale with integrated power generation and vast solar arrays:

· vs. Meta Hyperion (Richland Parish, Louisiana): Up to 5 GW power (scalable; phases starting at 2+ GW, ~77x larger), ~3,650 acres, 4+ million sq ft. One of the most ambitious single-company AI campuses built for advanced AI model training — vastly exceeds Bumblehive in power, land, and AI analytical capability.

At Amazon’s biggest data center, everything is supersized for AI

Picture below of Meta Hyperion (Richland Parish, Louisiana):

· vs. Major AWS / Stargate-related sites (e.g., New Carlisle, Indiana or Abilene, Texas clusters): Multi-GW scale (~2+ GW power, ~34x larger) with significant AI focus and massive campus footprint. Hyperscale AI/cloud workloads far beyond the old NSA facility’s surveillance focus.

Real aerial photo below of the large Stargate Abilene campus (already live and expanding) built for hyperscale AI workloads including OpenAI’s Stargate project:

· vs. Microsoft large AI campuses (e.g., Wisconsin, Texas, or other hyperscale clusters): Multiple 1+ GW sites (15x+ larger) with advanced GPU/liquid cooling designs. Represents a generational leap in compute power over Bumblehive-era tech. Picture of Microsoft’s Wisconsin campus below. The world’s most

powerful data center 2:

· vs. Google large clusters (e.g., Columbus, Ohio or similar multi-site campuses): Exceeding 1 GW total per key location, heavily AI-optimized with far greater scale, speed, and analytical sophistication than the 2010s-era Bumblehive.

These modern AI facilities dwarf the old Bumblehive in raw size, power demand, and especially in real-time AI processing capabilities.

Even If You Don’t Live Near a Data Center, This Threatens Your Freedom and Everyday Life

The infrastructure for total surveillance is not coming. It is already here and expanding at breakneck speed. These facilities do not just store data. They enable real-time tracking, retroactive searches, and AI-powered analysis of every aspect of our lives. They will collect information from all the cameras at every intersection (such as Flock Safety license plate readers), every Ring doorbell and home security camera, the entire Internet of Things (smart thermostats, watches, appliances, lights), smartphones and apps, social media platforms, financial transactions, cell towers, public WiFi, smart city infrastructure, drones, and countless other connected devices, creating a comprehensive digital picture of our daily lives.

We need to stop these data centers entirely, not just accept compromises on smaller versions or temporary moratoriums.

This is a high-speed train racing toward disaster for privacy and individual freedom. The battle appears already lost at the national level, with President Trump clearly supporting the rapid expansion of these AI data centers. We can only hope to slow this train down by fighting fiercely at the state, county, and city levels. Demand transparency and bans from

local officials, support community opposition efforts like those in Box Elder County, Nashville and all over the country. Speak out boldly.

Even if you do not live near one of these proposed hyperscale facilities, you must join the battle. These data centers will power the infrastructure for total surveillance, enabling real-time tracking, AI analysis of every aspect of your life.

Even if you do not live near one these AI data centers will power widespread digital money (CBDCs/Stablecoins or both) and digital IDs. And in doing so, will it hand governments and corporations unprecedented control over our financial lives and everyday personal freedoms.

Even if you do not live near one your water and power rates will increase dramatically and local watersheds will be drained and polluted.

Question for every American: Will the United States position itself as the central hub for “global data collection” with all its powerful data centers?

Our constitutional rights and way of life may depend on how effectively we resist at the grassroots level. The time to act is now.

Be a warrior, not a worrier.

Source: https://www.sgtreport.com/2026/06/data-collection-off-the-tracks-old-nsa-data-center-vs-new-hyperscale-ai-data-centers/

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Tucker Carlson recently confronted billionaire Shark Tank star Kevin O’Leary about his massive 40,000-acre “Stratus Project” data center in rural Utah… larger than 2,000 Walmarts… which will require 9 gigawatts of electricity (more than the entire state currently generates) and produce heat equivalent to 23 atom bombs detonating daily, while O’Leary falsely claims locals support it based on a 3-0 county commissioner vote that ignored a town hall full of furious residents.

O’Leary argues that the people of the United States, must accept total surveillance to “beat China” in AI. To which Carlson responds by noting that in 1940 it was not a crime to be Japanese, but in 1941 it was, proving that the definition of who is a “criminal” can change overnight. And that the data centers will turn the U.S. into a panopticon without any of China’s benefits.

Jimmy and Americans’ Comedian Kurt Metzger note that O’Leary and other tech billionaires are “in bed with China” despite pretending China is the enemy, and that the real purpose of AI data centers is to replace workers, surveil every movement, enable digital currency. And allow the government to shut off your car and freeze your bank account if you step out of line. The segment concludes that the only way to stop this is a worker strike… railroad workers, port workers, and truckers shutting down the economy. With a single demand: publicly funded elections with no billionaire or corporate money.

Source: https://odysee.com/@ProgressiveTruthSeekers:3/Tucker-Carlson-EVISCERATES:4

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U.S. still depends on China, despite years of onshoring efforts.

The trade-war between the U.S. and China has forced server makers out of the People’s Republic, greatly reducing reliance of American companies on producers from Tianxia. However, China remains the world’s largest producer of electrical equipment that is required to build power infrastructure inside and outside of AI data centers. To that end, shortages of power delivery equipment, including devices from China and other countries, are slowing project timelines, Bloomberg reports.

Despite the unprecedented level of investment in AI infrastructure — Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, and Microsoft are expected to spend more than $650 billion in 2026 to expand AI capacity — close to half of the planned U.S. data center builds this year are projected to be delayed or canceled, according to Bloomberg. One major reason behind these setbacks is the availability of key electrical components — such as transformers, switchgear, and batteries — that are used both at data center sites and outside of them, as AI companies must expand grid infrastructure to supply enough power to their data centers. Meanwhile, grid infrastructure is also stressed by electric vehicles and electrified heating systems.

Approximately 12 gigawatts (12 GW) of data center capacity is expected to come online in the U.S. in 2026, according to data by market intelligence firm Sightline Climate cited by Bloomberg. Yet only about one-third of that capacity is currently under active construction because of various constraints.

Electrical infrastructure represents less than 10% of total data center cost, but it is as vital as compute hardware. A delay in any single element of the power chain can halt the entire project, which makes transformers, switchgear, and similar devices critical items despite their relatively small share of CapEx.

Due to high demand, lead times for high-power transformers have expanded dramatically in the U.S.: delivery typically took 24 to 30 months before 2020, but waiting periods can stretch to as long as five years today, according to Sightline Climate cited by Bloomberg. For AI data centers, this is a catastrophe as their deployment cycles are under 18 months.

To address shortages, companies are turning to global markets. As a result, Canada, Mexico, and South Korea became the biggest suppliers of high-power transformers for AI data centers to AI data centers. At the same time, imports of high-power transformers from China surged from fewer than 1,500 units in 2022 to more than 8,000 units in 2025 through October, according to Wood Mackenzie data cited by Bloomberg.

The volatility of exports from China does not end with transformers, as the PRC accounts for over 40% of U.S. battery imports, while its share in certain transformer and switchgear categories remains near 30%, according to Bloomberg.

Without resolving constraints in transformers, switchgear, and batteries, even trillions of dollars in AI investment may not translate into actual AI capacity, as deployments will depend on power infrastructure availability, not capital or compute hardware constraints.

Despite a decade of reshoring initiatives, U.S. manufacturing capacity for electrical equipment remains insufficient, which means that AI companies continue to rely on imports even amid tariffs and national security concerns. Meanwhile, tensions between China and the U.S. threaten to further disrupt supply chains, which will raise costs and could delay deployments of advanced AI data centers.

Source: https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/artificial-intelligence/half-of-planned-us-data-center-builds-have-been-delayed-or-canceled-growth-limited-by-shortages-of-power-infrastructure-and-parts-from-china-the-ai-build-out-flips-the-breakers

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Taxpayers in Texas and Virginia are subsidizing data centers by handing out over $1 billion a year to tech companies. More than 30 states subsidize data centers and Big Tech with massive tax breaks. And while CEOs have promised thousands of jobs, they haven’t materialized.

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wLX_w0TtBpY&t=3s

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So much POWER!!!! Taking a look at Applied Digital’s NVIDIA Supermicro SuperCluster! Thank you Applied Digital for letting us get a behind-the-scenes look at your modern data center!

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zcwqTkbaZ0o

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As a little known company has proposed a data center and natural gas plant in the tourism destination — known for its natural wonder and outdoor recreation — residents are left with questions, mounting concerns and few answers.

As a child, Nikki Forrester dreamed of living in a cabin in the woods surrounded by mountains, trees, water and the outdoor opportunities that came with the natural land. In 2022 — four years after earning her graduate degree and moving to Tucker County from Pittsburgh — Forrester and her partner made that dream a reality when they bought two acres of land near Davis, West Virginia to build a home.

Forrester has thrived in the small mountain town known for its mountain biking, hiking, stargazing, waterfalls and natural scenery. She and her partner moved into their new home in February. Hiking and biking trails are right outside her front door. In the winter, she said, snow piles up making the nearby mountains look like “heaven on Earth.”

It’s been quite literally a dream come true.

“I feel like I’ve never felt at home so much before. I love being in the woods. I love this community. It’s super cheesy, but this was my childhood dream and now it’s actually come true,” Forrester said. “It felt so good to set down roots here. We knew Davis was where we wanted to start our future.”

But in March, one small public notice posted in the Parsons Advocate — noticed by resident Pamela Moe, who scrambled to find answers after seeing it — changed Forrester’s assumptions about that future.

A Virginia-based company, Fundamental Data, was applying for an air permit from the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection for what it called the “Ridgeline Facility.” The company’s heavily redacted application showed plans to build an off-the-grid natural gas power plant between Thomas and Davis. That power plant will likely be designed to power an enormous data center just a mile out from Tucker County’s most populous and tourist-attracting areas.

Earlier this month, representatives for Fundamental Data — who did not respond to requests for comment on this article — told the Wall Street Journal that the facility could be “among the largest data center campuses in the world,” spanning 10,000 acres across Tucker and Grant counties if fully realized.

Now, Forrester said, she and her neighbors are in the middle of what feels like a “fight for [their] lives” as they attempt to learn more about the vague development plans and fight against “big data.”

Her images of the future — skiing on white snow, hiking through waterfalls, looking up at clear and starry nights all with one-of-a-kind mountain scenery below — now exist in the shadows of a looming natural gas plant, an industrial complex and the contaminants that could come with them. The fresh, mountain air that surrounds her home and community could be infiltrated by tons of nitrogen oxide (gases that contribute to smog), carbon monoxide, particulate matter and other volatile organic compounds, per the company’s air permit application.

“Honestly, I feel like if this happens, it will destroy this place. People come here because it’s remote, it’s small, it’s surrounded by nature. If you have a giant power plant coughing up smoke and noise pollution and light pollution, it puts all of those things in jeopardy,” Forrester said. “It would honestly make me question whether I would want to live here anymore, because I do love the landscapes here so much, but they would be fundamentally altered and, I think, irreparably harmed if this actually comes to be.”

Tucker United and a fight against the many ‘unknowns’

Since learning of the project in March, Forrester and dozens of other Tucker County residents have banned together and formed Tucker United. The residents — all volunteers — want answers from Fundamental Data or anyone else regarding details of the proposed Ridgeline facility.

But that fight hasn’t been easy. The state DEP has allowed Fundamental Data — a company with little to no information publicly available — to submit a redacted air permit application, omitting details regarding potential air pollutants that could come from the site.

According to reporting in Country Roads News, local officials were unaware of the project before reporters and members of the public brought it to their attention.

Reading the Wall Street Journal article was the first time most residents were alerted about the potential size of the planned development.

Josh Nease, who lives outside of Thomas and Davis in an unincorporated part of Tucker County, said the unknowns about the project have been the most frustrating part to grapple with.

“There’s no lack of uncertainty right now, that’s for sure,” said Nease, a sixth generation West Virginian who moved to Tucker County after spending vacations there as a child growing up in Bridgeport. “I think the unknowns here are really worrying.”

If given the chance, he would want to ask representatives of Fundamental Data the following questions: Why the lack of transparency? Why does the company want to locate in Tucker County and why not further out from the towns? And why does it feel like there’s resistance against working with the local governments and community members?

Luanne McGovern, an engineer by trade who owns property in Tucker County and who sits on the board of West Virginia Highlands Conservancy, an environmental nonprofit in the region, holds similar frustrations to Nease.

Per the permit application, the Ridgeline facility — in its currently proposed form — would use gas-fueled turbines with heat recovery steam generators. Diesel would be kept on site in three 10 million gallon storage tanks as a backup power source in case of gas line interruptions. Those tanks would be 66 feet tall and 180 feet in diameter. Leaks from pumps and valves, among other pieces of equipment, are to be expected per the application. Operations for the facility should begin by 2028.

When residents started working together to make sense of Fundamental Data’s air permit application, they asked McGovern to look it over and share her thoughts. Having worked on similar permit requests before, she knew what she was looking at: A large, natural gas power plant.

What was more notable, however, was what she was unable to view.

Pollutants were listed on the request, but only in annual caps. There was no information on water usage despite some data centers using up to 5 million gallons of drinking water a day, straining resources in communities. While the heights of the diesel storage tanks were included, she said information on the turbines wasn’t.

While the DEP asked for clarification on Fundamental Data’s redactions following an influx of public comments from concerned residents, the company said it believed the omitted information met the state’s standard for confidentiality. The DEP ended up agreeing.

Fundamental Data, through its representative Casey Chapman, provided some details to the DEP in an attempt to put the public at ease: the site “does not plan” to use water from local water systems, rivers or streams and won’t discharge wastewater into them; mountains surrounding the development should “substantially limit” its visibility from populated areas and the facility “expects” to operate at noise levels that adhere with federal regulations.

But McGovern still had questions.

“Where is the water coming from? How high are these turbines? Where will they be? If we had some answers to these questions, we could do some modeling and figure out what the potential environmental impact would be, but we don’t,” McGovern said. “We’re just completely in the dark. There’s so many unanswered questions. As an engineer, there’s huge parts of this permit that are just bad. There’s no information provided, not even a level of standard of information that you would expect.”

Nease is realistic; he understands that these are complex issues and the state — as well as his region — are attempting to find new ways to bolster the economy and, hopefully, improve West Virginia’s economic standings long term.

He sees the challenges hitting Tucker County residents every day. There’s a housing shortage and short-term rentals are driving up costs for the places that do exist, pricing out residents who can’t afford to live where they work. While tourism can bring in crowds, it’s often only seasonal. The county’s population — like most of West Virginia — is declining.

“I fully understand the need to diversify the economy. I support doing that, we talk about it all the time. I guess I’m just not sure that a project like this is the solution,” Nease said. “We just don’t know enough about it. We don’t know if this is going to benefit the Tucker County economy. I sure hope it does, but all I have to rely on for that are vague statements.”

‘It feels extractive:’ West Virginia data centers to operate with no local oversight, questionable economic gains

On March 18 — the same day that Fundamental Data submitted its air permit application to the DEP — House Bill 2014 was introduced at the state Legislature to incentivize data centers to locate in West Virginia and generate their own power sources through microgrids. Senate President Randy Smith, a Republican who represents Tucker County and voted for HB 2014, did not respond to requests for comment on this article.

Despite being a key priority for Gov. Patrick Morrisey who requested its introduction, the bill was presented more than halfway through the state’s 60-day session. In back-and-forths over several weeks, lawmakers amended the bill again and again. One change removed a requirement for microgrids to use renewable energy sources, opening the door for coal and natural gas. Several other amendments changed the tax structure for any property taxes collected on the developments.

The version of the bill that now stands as law allows “high impact data centers” to curtail local zoning ordinances and other regulatory processes and establishes a certified microgrid program, which means data centers can produce and use their own power without attaching to already existing utilities.

The law creates a specialized tax structure for data centers and microgrids, which must be placed in designated districts. Local governments have little say or control over those districts, which are established at the state level.

Taxes collected on any data centers and microgrids operating in West Virginia would be split as so: 50% will go to the personal income tax reduction fund, 30% will go to the county where the data center is located, 10% will go to the remaining 54 counties split on a per capita basis using the most recent U.S. Census, 5% will be placed in the Economic Enhancement Grant Fund administered by the Water Development Authority and the final 5% will be put in the newly created Electric Grid Stabilization and Security Fund.

Initially, those taxes were going to be completely diverted away from localities where the data centers would be located, angering county commissioners and other local leaders from throughout the state.

Kelly Allen, executive director of the West Virginia Center on Budget and Policy, said the fact that 50% of any tax revenue collected going to offset the state’s personal income tax cuts is a concern, especially while only 30% will return to localities that host the data centers.

“Local governments are really limited in the ways that they can raise revenue, which is largely controlled by either the state constitution or the state legislature. So taking away a significant slice of one of the only ways that they can raise revenue — through property taxes — leaves [localities] with fewer options to fund basic services,” Allen said. “At the same time, these data centers and micro grids are probably going to increase the need for the public services that local governments pay for.”

Allen pointed to the potential risks that come with operating power plants: county fire and police services will be needed for safety at the plants and water districts may be impacted, she said.

Essentially, she said, counties will be on the hook for funding more services while only receiving a fraction of the revenue generated by the sources of those costs.

And, generally, there’s no guarantee — despite Fundamental Data’s claims for the Tucker County facility — that data centers will serve as massive employers.

Nationwide, according to the U.S. Census, jobs in data centers are increasing. But more than 40% of all jobs in 2023 existed in just three states. Per an analysis by Business Insider, most of the data center jobs available are only in construction and contracted from outside the places the centers are located.

Data centers are largely automated. Microsoft, for example, employs just 50 people per a facility. In West Virginia — because of the inclusion of microgrids, which aren’t mandated to be created for data centers — the picture could look different. But again, the lack of details from companies coming here makes the real impact difficult if not impossible to determine.

Allen said she’s wary of the state’s potential reliance on data centers for a financial boom given the state’s history of extraction-based economics.

Like with the coal economy, residents across the state will bear the aesthetic, environmental and health costs associated with living near data centers and their power plants. Most of the profits, however, may not return to them, Allen said.

“It’s not exactly identical to coal or natural gas or timber, but it feels extractive in the same way in that the benefits of the data center are borne by people outside of West Virginia, while the costs are borne by our residents,” Allen said.

Nease said that while he wants to be “pragmatic” about the potential for development in Tucker County, he can’t help but think of the state’s history in that regard either.

“I’m worried we’re going to fall into that same trap again. It’s an age old story — not just for West Virginia. Some people are going to benefit from this project, they just might not be here,” Nease said. “The company will benefit, its [shareholders] will. But will we?”

‘A race to the bottom:’ While West Virginia lawmakers want to compete with Virginia, locals say it’s not possible

While state lawmakers spent hours this legislative session debating how to craft the state’s new law to attract data centers, several couldn’t stop thinking about — or mentioning — neighboring Virginia, where the development of large, high-impact data centers have boomed.

Echoing sentiments shared by Morrisey through his “Backyard Brawl” plan to compete with neighboring states economically, delegates — including Del. Clay Riley, R-Harrison, who sits on the House Committee on Energy and Public Works, where the bill passed — said they wanted to see data center development here thrive like it has in Northern Virginia.

Loudoun County, Virginia has been dubbed “Data Center Alley.” It’s home to the largest data center market in the world.

But that development didn’t happen overnight, said Julie Bolthouse, director of land use at Piedmont Environmental Council in Virginia.

The industry started building in Northern Virginia in the 1990s and 2000s. Some of the largest data and internet providers at the time were located there. Over time, though, the market has changed.

Bolthouse said what used to be small complexes organized like business parks — featuring restaurants, shopping, day cares and more for people who lived in the region — are now large campuses with few people, no outside amenities and mostly computers and software.

And those “hyper-scaled” complexes — in Virginia and beyond — haven’t come without costs. The pollutants emitted by large centers are known to exacerbate respiratory problems and other health conditions. Residents nearby can hear the incessant buzzing and hums of the computers and generators at work. Light pollution, depending on the size and type of facility, can be impossible to ignore.

But these issues — outside of the environmental ones — vary place to place because of local ordinances.

“That is like the only thing that’s really protecting Virginia communities, because the only way that the people who live in these localities are able to get any kind of protection is because of noise ordinances, because of the lighting ordinances,” Bolthouse said.

In West Virginia under HB 2014, residents won’t have the same protections or powers due to the state’s superseding of local ordinances.

And now, decades into Virginia’s ever changing data center sector, Bolthouse and other environmentalists are seeking more regulations on the state level since the nature of these data centers has changed so much over such a short period of time.

“That’s the push we’re seeing now — for the state to come in and add additional regulations, to look at the environmental impact,” Bolthouse said. “No one is talking about taking away the ability of localities to regulate these facilities. I can’t imagine that.”

And while the landscape for data centers is evolving in Loudoun County and beyond, the reason so many large companies have decided to locate their centers in Northern Virginia goes back to the 1990s. The infrastructure for them to be developed, Bolthouse said, already existed — it wasn’t newly created like West Virginia is attempting to do.

“There’s such a robust fiber network here. These data centers are kind of like a gigantic global computer. They talk to each other, and so the closer they are to all the other cloud providers, the better,” Bolthouse said. “When you put a data center here, your data is stored in Northern Virginia and you are in spitting distance to [Amazon], Google, Microsoft, all the big co-locators … probably every big business has an operation here in Northern Virginia. So it’s like the Wall Street of the data center industry. That’s why they want to locate here.”

Bolthouse warned that without regulations, without protections and without the advantages that Virginia has through its location and infrastructure, West Virginia could be attempting to enter a new sector by inviting in the “worst players.”

“What you’re going to get if you do it this way is the worst players, the ones that didn’t need to be in Northern Virginia … the players that are wanting that lack of regulations because they didn’t want to abide by rules and didn’t want to or need to protect communities, which is worse for West Virginia and the communities,” Bolthouse said. “What West Virginia is doing is not what Virginia is doing.”

She said West Virginia needs to look at the assets it already has, not the assets others in the sector have worked with for decades.

Those assets, in Bolthouse’s words, are the same things that made Forrester feel like her childhood dreams were coming true when she built a home in Tucker County: the state’s “beautiful mountains, its rivers, its natural beauty and outdoor opportunities.”

“That’s what West Virginia should be leveraging. The state shouldn’t be trying to get something that another state has already secured the market on,” Bolthouse said. “I don’t know that West Virginia can become the next Data Center Alley. I don’t think that’s actually feasible … You’re trying to basically have a race to the bottom, and you’re only going to get the worst players.”

Source:  https://westvirginiawatch.com/2025/05/28/it-will-destroy-this-place-tucker-county-residents-fight-for-future-against-proposed-data-center/

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