Geaing up for data centers

Larimer County heading for a six-month moratorium on data center proposals and Weld County nearing adoption of regs. It’s a prime subject in Colorado.

by Allen Best

NEXT MONDAY IN FORT COLLINS, the Larimer County commissioners will consider adopting a six-month moratorium on data centers.

The moratorium would give county planners time to consider new regulations that may be necessary to ensure the county’s best interests are protected if data center proposals formally arrive.

Scott Benton, the county’s environmental planner, told Big Pivots that a 30-day moratorium adopted last week was spurred by inquiries from two data center developers.

“We like to be prepared. That’s the reason for this moratorium, to make sure we are when something does come.”

Larimer, like about half of Colorado counties, uses the 1041 regulatory process approved by state legislators in the early 1970s for review of water and many other projects. Nobody was thinking about data centers 50 years ago. The regulations, said Benton, need to define what is and what is not a data center.

“I am an ecologist and have been in planning for 25 years,” Benton told me. “When you see the numbers and scale for developments like this, it really gets the gears turning,” he said of his thinking. “It’s important to think about this appropriately.”

Existing regulations do cover solar projects, although so far solar projects in Larimer County max out at about 20 acres. Some land exists, however, that might be suitable for up to a 500-acre project. The area around the existing Rawhide coal-fired power plant comes to mind.

Data centers can be small but they can also be very, very big. The QTS Data Center in Aurora near the intersection of I-70 and E-470 qualifies. It’s called a hyper-scale data center. So is the data center being talked about at the Logan County. If no definite proposal has been submitted, developers have talked with county commissioners in Sterling about a potential 4,000-acre operation consisting presumably of large swathes of solar panels plus and the data center itself.

In the case of Logan County, the greatest tension lies in the prospect of giant amounts of solar. Solar developers worry about deep setbacks from roads impairing the economics of projects. Some of this is discussed in recent stories in Big Pivots:

• “Difficult decisions on Colorado’s eastern plains,” Jan. 26

• “Growing microprocessors instead of wheat,” Dec. 16

Other counties in Colorado are also having discussions or are adopting regulations.

Saguache County

Saguache County commissioners are scheduled to spend time this afternoon talking about data centers.

Weld County

Spurred by the prospect of a proposal for a data center at Windsor, near the former Kodak plant, Weld County in November began drawing up regulations. Those regulations were approved on first reading and will be up for approval on the second of three readings on Monday.

David Eisenbraun, the planning director for Weld County, suggested to Big Pivots that this was not a heavy lift for the county. “Weld County is accustomed to heavy industrial uses, whether compressor stations or other large energy-using infrastructure,” he said.

As for energy and water use — that’s to be determined by other jurisdictions. The data center developer must only provide proof that it is covered.

And Weld County already has large solar installations, with more to come. In data centers it sees an opportunity for economic diversification.

“Oil and gas remain a strong foundation for the county, but it is inherently cyclical. Industries like data centers can help broaden our long-term revenue portfolio by introducing additional, more stable property-tax-based funding sources that support core county services and infrastructure over time,” Eisenbraun said in an e-mail. “From a fiscal responsibility standpoint, this diversification strengthens our resilience and long-term economic viability.”

Adoption of the regulations was triggered by Global AI’s purchase of 438 acres at the Windsor industrial site. Eisenbaum said the company is in the very early stages of its development plans.

Weld County has been seeing much solar development. Among the new proposals is Taelor Solar’s project east of Roggen. It would straddle Weld and Morgan counties about 60 miles northeast of Denver. Plans call for up to 1.3 gigawatts of solar production. That would far surpass Colorado’s current largest, Neptune, in Pueblo County, at 325 megawatts. The project plans in Weld County also call for battery storage of 650 megawatt-hours with a possible increase to 1,300 MWh. See the Weld County details here.