00:00Memphis has a new plan for its data center fight, and it comes just days after a council meeting ended
00:06with police clearing the room.
00:08In Maryland, a developer is suing a county executive over a frozen campus, and Google just locked in a massive
00:16nuclear deal.
00:19Memphis is now trying to get ahead of its own data center fight.
00:22On Friday, Mayor Paul Young issued an executive order creating a 90-day working group to develop guidelines for data
00:32centers in the city.
00:33It comes days after the city council voted 7-5 to postpone a requested 12-month moratorium, a decision that
00:42left protesters refusing to leave the chamber until police cleared the room.
00:47A fistfight broke out between two women in the lobby, and one person was detained.
00:53At the center of the anger is a deal the mayor negotiated with XAI, now space XAI, which council members
01:02say they still know little about because non-disclosure agreements were signed.
01:06That agreement is expected to bring about $100 million in property tax revenue.
01:12With 25% steered to residents within 5 miles of the facility.
01:19That opposition is now making its way into courtrooms in Maryland.
01:24Quantum Maryland, the developer of a 2,100-acre computing campus in Frederick County,
01:31has sued County Executive Jessica Fitzwater.
01:35The county and the Planning Commission, the complaint, filed Thursday,
01:40accuses Fitzwater of unlawfully suspending a data center zoning ordinance for political gain.
01:47It says, quote,
01:49When an agreement with Quantum served her politically, she negotiated it and celebrated it.
01:55But when the political winds shifted, she did too.
01:59Fitzwater announced a moratorium in July, a day after Maryland's highest court rejected a voter referendum.
02:06And it has since been extended to July of next year.
02:10Quantum says the freeze costed a $500 million transaction.
02:15And it wants its land use approval reinstated.
02:19Plus damages.
02:21And the reason fights like these keep erupting comes down to one thing.
02:26Power.
02:27Google and Constellation Energy have announced a 20-year agreement to add 890
02:32megawatts of new nuclear capacity to the PJM grid.
02:37Through uprates at 11 Constellation-owned units across six sites in Illinois,
02:43Pennsylvania,
02:44and New Jersey,
02:46a separate 15-year agreement covers another 2,700 megawatts of existing PJM.
02:52Generation.
02:53Constellation.
02:54Constellation says it will invest more than $4.3 billion.
02:59With the first uprate expected by 2028.
03:02And the companies project about 7,200 construction jobs.
03:08Google's Amanda Peterson Corio said the company is committed to meeting its growth responsibly.
03:14As the deal aims to strengthen the grid while protecting affordability for the 67 million.
03:20People PJM serves.
03:23The pressure on the grid is only half the story.
03:27Because water tells the other half.
03:30Back in Memphis,
03:31a local group called Protect the Aquifer presented a groundwater protection plan on Wednesday.
03:38Focused on preventing contamination and on conservation.
03:42Supporters say it will help preserve and protect the drinking water the city depends on.
03:47The group's Christine Green said they need a little more information.
03:51And she is asking neighbors for first-hand accounts of dumping sites, flooding sites,
03:57and other problems they have experienced to help shape the next steps.
04:02The plan lands as scrutiny of data centers' environmental impact keeps growing in local groups put.
04:09Water use front and center.
04:11For residents here, the question is simple.
04:15How much of a shared resource will large facilities be allowed to draw?
04:21State legislators are taking notice.
04:24But local boards are also learning how costly it is to change the rules midstream.
04:28In Loudoun County, Virginia, home to data center Alley, supervisors voted 7-2 on Tuesday to table a proposal that
04:39would have ended grandfathering.
04:41Protections for some pending data center applications.
04:45Supervisors Laura Tekroni and Julie Briskman argued the county already has too many data centers.
04:52But staff warned that revoking the protections would likely lead to litigation costing up to $60 million.
05:00And a fallback plan for a $200,000 independent audit died as well.
05:0615 applications totaling 10.5 million square feet currently meet the grandfathering.
05:13Requirements
05:14And the protections remain in place until they sunset in February of 2028.
05:20Yet despite that regulatory wave, construction is pressing forward.
05:26Amazon Web Services has filed a preliminary land development plan for 36 data center.
05:33Buildings at the Homer City Energy Campus in Indiana County, Pennsylvania, about 50 miles east of Pittsburgh,
05:41The site once hosted a coal plant that operated from 1969 to 2023.
05:47The buildings would be two stories, roughly 225,000 square feet each, spread across 1100 acres, and powered by a
05:584.5 gigawatt natural gas plant that is under construction.
06:03AWS projects 1,500 to 2,000 jobs.
06:07With construction beginning this December in four phases and full completion targeted for June of 2036.
06:15The company has also committed to a community benefits agreement for the project.
06:22Construction on the ground tells its own story.
06:25Vantage Data Center's CEO Shuriel Choksi said this week that the company is constructing 10 buildings at once at its
06:34Frontier campus in Texas.
06:36Together those buildings represent 1.4 gigawatts of capacity.
06:41The comment was pitched as a direct counterpoint to recent reports of delays in building AI capacity.
06:48Suggesting that at least at this site, the work is moving on a massive scale.
06:54Vantage unveiled Frontier as a $25 billion campus in Texas.
06:59And 10 simultaneous builds puts a sharp point on how quickly developers are trying to turn
07:05an announced gigawatts into steel, concrete, and servers.
07:10It is one more sign that, for all the local fights across the country,
07:15the largest projects are still racing to deliver the power and space that AI customers demand.
07:22And the financial commitment behind all of this is staggering.
07:26Even as the industry works to win over skeptical communities,
07:30Amazon Web Services has pledged $1 billion in new spending over five years for communities
07:37that host its data centers.
07:40On top of existing commitments,
07:43the money targets education, job training, energy affordability,
07:48and water and energy conservation.
07:51Oz CEO Matt Garman said the United States can't afford to lose the AI race.
07:57The pledge arrives amid mounting resistance.
08:00Environment America counts at least 45 projects blocked across 27 states.
08:07Valued at $68 billion.
08:10And a recent CBS News poll found more Americans oppose data centers in their areas than favor them.
08:17Whether a billion dollars can change that sentiment may shape where the next wave of campuses gets
08:23built.
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