Local communities in Ohio resist data center construction

By Amelia Wysong/Kent State NewsLab

On a recent week night at the Twinsburg Public Library, residents Sue Clark, Cindy Steele and  Laurie Facsina addressed a group of roughly 30 community members about why they should oppose new data center construction in their city. 

“The companies behind the data center boom are moving quickly into communities across the region, many with the promises of prosperity,” Clark said to the group. “But some communities are pushing back and saying that data centers are not worth the health and environmental impacts at this time.” 

Supporters say data centers provide a centralized, efficient and secure location for computing resources that allow growth in an advancing technological landscape. Despite benefits, resistance is growing due to the centers’ massive need for electricity and water. Some municipalities in Ohio, including Twinsburg, have placed temporary moratoriums on data center construction.

Clark and Steele’s presentations – given June 17 at a Community Conversation hosted by Twinsburg City Council Member at-large Shaun Castillo – addressed specific concerns regarding data centers’ usage of local energy and water resources based on research they conducted. They also provided suggestions to the local officials making decisions on data center development.

“The three [suggestions] that we have today in this presentation are to amend the zoning code to specifically state that data centers are not a permitted or conditional use, [to] clarify that data centers are not allowed anywhere within the city limits, and ultimately, this should go to the ballot so residents can make a choice,” Steele said. 

While rapid development of data centers has sparked concern, they are important infrastructure in an artificial intelligence-driven economy, said Baiju Shah, president and CEO of Greater Cleveland Partnership (GCP). 

“We all are using data centers every single day,” he said. “Everyone that has a phone or a computer, whether it’s for storage in the quote ‘cloud’ or for compute that’s occurring through AI tools or otherwise, we’re all leveraging this infrastructure.”

Data centers are an investment for regions beyond the construction phase, Shah said. They are an integral part of computing-intensive businesses like analytics, which need to be located near compute facilities. “And so, as a region, for us to want to continue to be a region that attracts and grows these types of businesses in an AI-driven economy, we have to have this infrastructure in our geography. Otherwise we are foregoing a segment of our economy.” 

Shah said the companies make large investments in the initial construction of data center buildings, but the maintenance and upkeep of equipment also provide jobs after the construction is completed. Cleveland-area manufacturing firms will continue to benefit from the equipment and maintenance of data centers after they are built. 

While data centers help benefit economic development, Steele said their high energy use would raise costs for consumers. Data centers require the construction of new transmission lines and substations; costs which utilities pass on to consumers and defer from data center operators through contracts or incentives. 

“There’s a major policy debate [over] who should pay for this,” Steele said. “Should it be consumers? Or should it be the companies that are building these data center [hyperscalers]?”

Another concern discussed was water usage by data centers. Centers use large amounts of fresh water to cool servers, Clark said in her portion of the presentation. The water used must be clean, fresh water to prevent problems like corrosion or bacteria growth. 

“Computing power requires enormous amounts of water, leaving little for local communities and farming,” Clark told the group. 

In Ravenna, Ohio, the city council voted unanimously on a 12-month moratorium to give city leaders more time to study the issues and concerns around data centers and make informed decisions moving forward, said Rob Kairis, Ravenna City Council president.

“There’s a lot of things to consider,” Kairis said. “Obviously, the main thing is people don’t want data centers, and we have to be very conscious of what our public thinks.” 

During the moratorium period, city leaders want to bring in experts to help provide a better understanding on the major concerns of data center development, Kairis said. “I think the major concerns we’re having are environmental, utilities … how much water a data center might use, and obviously the big one is electricity.” 

The grass-roots organization Conserve Ohio proposed a constitutional amendment to ban data centers and is working to get the issue on the ballot. They did not collect enough signatures to get the issue on the ballot in November and are now looking to the 2027 ballot. 

GCP outlines a smart-growth approach for data center development that addresses some of the concerns community members have regarding energy and water use. One of the smart-growth principles says that data center developers should bear the cost of energy generation and required grid enhancement, Shah said. 

As for water use concerns, most new data centers plans and construction use closed-system cooling approaches that do not draw the same high levels of water usage as earlier generations of data centers, Shah said. 

“There’s a great example of this in the one that is operational already just south of Sandusky,” Shah explained. “Built on a brownfield, so that alone is a good thing … bringing land back into productive use, land that had basically been idled by an old manufacturing site, bringing that back, using or contracting for 100% renewable energy and full closed loop system for cooling.” 

GCP is working to assemble and share resources to interested organizations at the local level, Shah said. 

“I think it’s really important … that the officials in these communities and the residents understand what they are evaluating and exploring and being thoughtful about it,” Shah said. “This is a massive opportunity for our region.”  

This story was written by Amelia Wysong for Kent State NewsLab, which shares stories by Kent State University School of Media and Journalism students with professional media partners. This story was produced in association with Media in the Public Interest and funded in part by the George Gund Foundation.