A company proposing to build one of the world’s largest and most powerful data centers in rural Oldham County has shifted its plans due to local resistance, announcing Monday it would change locations and be significantly smaller.
Western Hospitality Partners announced in late March it planned to build a 2 million square-foot hyperscale data center complex of eight buildings using 600 megawatts of power on 267 acres of land zoned for agriculture. Data centers house computer servers that store and process data for things like cloud storage, streaming platforms and artificial intelligence. The company planned to invest $6 billion in its construction, which would make it the largest economic development project in the history of Kentucky.
This planned development drew stiff opposition from residents who feared its size and pollution would wreck what makes the quiet area a great place to live. Opponents also accused the company of attempting to skirt zoning ordinances by designating itself as a “private utility” so it could build heavy industry on agricultural land, bypassing the normal rezoning approval from the county’s elected fiscal court.
In a press release Monday, Western Hospitality Partners announced a change of plans, as it would instead try to build a data center at 3210 DW Griffith Lane, which is currently the 30-acre site of a drive-in movie theater between LaGrange and Buckner.
Abie Kassin of Western Hospitality Partners states that the company altered its plans “after hearing the community’s concerns about the Highway 53 site and working closely with numerous leaders within the community.”
“We know that a data center of any kind and size will bring lasting benefits to the community, and we remain committed to bringing OC Data Center to Oldham County,” Kassin said. “By creating a new stream of tax revenue for the community, the OC Data Center will significantly enhance schools, the police force, the LaGrange Fire and Rescue, and many other general community services.”
The company’s press release indicated the new property would include an electric power substation and it would “work closely with local utilities to finalize the necessary infrastructure upgrades to support the facility without creating increased pricing for community customers as a result of the project.” The site is next door to Louisville Gas & Electric’s Buckner substation and East Kentucky Power Cooperative’s Bluegrass Generating Station plant.
The Western Hospitality Partners release included favorable quotes from Oldham County Judge-Executive David Voegele and the president of the county’s chamber of commerce. Voegele stated that the data center would give the county “the opportunity to diversify our tax base while creating significant new revenue.”
Though the company’s statement was scant on specific details for the new site, Voegle also issued his own statement that revealed the project’s smaller scale. He said it would include just two buildings on the site, compared to the eight massive buildings for the original property.
Noting that he opposed the original location for the data center and encouraged other sites, Voegele said the new site “appears to be an appropriate location” and is “zoned industrial.” He added that the company would go through the same local process of seeking a conditional use permit as a “private utility,” which could be approved by the appointed board of adjustments.
The Oldham County PVA website shows the smaller alternate property for the data center is zoned commercial, not industrial.
A spokesperson for Western Hospitality Partners said no one from the company was available to answer questions about the new project on Tuesday.
Both the original and newly-proposed sites for the data center are in the district of Republican House Speaker David Osborne. He had not previously commented publicly on the project, but criticized the choice of the original site in a statement Tuesday to Kentucky Public Radio.
“It was obvious from the beginning that the original proposal was poorly conceived,” Osborne said. “It remains to be seen if the new location will be a better fit, but ultimately it is a decision for the county.”
Local resistance expected to continue
Nate Oberg, whose family property adjoins the original proposed location of the data center, created We Are Oldham County in April, a group that picked up thousands of members in the weeks after the announcement and has organized opposition to the project.
Despite the company’s announcement that it is switching properties for the data center, Oberg only called that a “slight victory” and said his group will continue its mission.
“The fight still goes on,” Oberg said Tuesday. “It's always been my position that without regulation in place, Oldham County is still at risk.”
Oberg noted the company is seeking approval through the same permitting process as a private utility, a designation that would allow the data center to be built anywhere in the county.
“The point is we need a definition of what a hyperscale data facility is, and we need a comprehensive plan that includes the expansion of heavy industry into Oldham County, and then we need planning and zoning regulation for data facilities here to protect the people in Oldham County,” he said.
The Oldham County Fiscal Court meets Tuesday afternoon and plans to take up a new moratorium on data centers, but Oberg says it would still allow Western Hospitality Partners’ new application for the alternate property to go forward unimpeded.
“This is just a last ditch effort to circumvent the process, to circumvent any moratorium that will be coming down the road soon,” Oberg said. “There's no real teeth in this.”
State government and politics reporting is supported in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
