Southwest Ohio’s next data center might be in Clermont County.
A San Francisco-based company, Crane Data Centers, proposed a 300-megawatt project to members of the Pierce Township Zoning Commission Tuesday night.
“Most of our customers are typically cloud sources, like banks, hospitals, people that need to store their data,” said Lance Mobley, the company’s site acquisition director. “This isn’t a large facility, so most AI companies aren't interested in smaller ones.”
The proposed three buildings would sit on 300 acres of land adjacent to the now-closed Beckjord power plant. If the project goes as planned, Mobley said it would employ about 150 people once operational, which could take several years.
Zoning commission president Jeff Stitt said he hoped the company would purchase and remediate the land where coal ash pits created by Beckjord still need cleanup. Mobley said his company hopes to avoid them, but is interested in exploring ways to make the campus desirable for the community, such as building a children’s playground, dog park or walking trails to buffer the site.
He cited a near-complete project in Forest Grove, Oregon where he said they designed around a historic sequoia tree.
But when asked if Crane had examples of other sites, Mobley said he could not provide much detail about how the company has served other communities.
“To be honest with you, we're kind of a new company, so we've only actually built one project,” Mobley said. “Our other projects are under development, just like this one, and they range in location and land type.”
Residents ask questions
About 20 residents attended the meeting to ask Mobley about water use, lighting and visibility of the proposed data center.
One resident, Carene Kunkler, said she’s concerned about a data center wiping out the green landscape and replacing it with industrial views.
“Find a way to make it the least noticeable to boaters, people that are enjoying beautiful Ohio,” Kunkler said.
Elizabeth Mozer said she hoped Crane would keep the lights low, unlike the previous tenants.
“Beckjord does not comply by the dark sky recommendations of lower lights and lower lumens. It is very bright and it's sad when we do have celestial events,” she said.
In response, Mobley said the facility’s lights would be aimed downward and shielded.
Husband and wife Doug and Angie Dresie raised concerns about the potential noise — especially after Angie said she’s seen videos of noisy data centers on Facebook.
“The humming of it was so loud that they were like, ‘I can't even live here anymore. My life is ruined,’” Angie said. “Oh, that scared me.”
Mobley said his company encloses its generators to dampen the humming sound many have begun to associate with data centers.
But facilities operating at similar kilovolts do hum to an extent, he said.
“Sometimes they sound like a river just flowing, they buzz,” Mobley said. “I'm not sure we could control something like that.”
Mobley also answered Doug’s concerns about emissions by citing the Oregon site’s use of renewable energy rather than diesel. He said the center would use water in a closed-loop system, meaning it would only need to draw water from the community once — roughly as much as a residential swimming pool — for indefinite use.
For the Dresies, Mobley’s presentation was enough to ease their fears.
“From hearing him personally, I'm not as afraid as I was,” Angie said.
Doug added the jury is still out for him, but he’s encouraged by the company’s seeming care for the environment and community.
“Hopefully, if this goes forward, they continue down that path and uphold their values,” Doug said.
The commission’s response
Commissioners said they plan to discuss the proposal at the next meeting, on Oct. 6.
Though Stitt said he’s amenable to the idea because it considers land along U.S. Route 52 he said would be ideal for a data center, other members of the commission expressed some skepticism.
Commissioner Dick Schuler said he understands the need for data centers but isn’t sure Pierce Township is the right location —-- especially after Mobley said the project may require leveling some of an existing hill.
“Why would one pick what I consider [a] topographically beautiful bedroom community to put a data center in?” Schuler asked, adding he’d rather see the data center built on the old power plant site rather than nearby “virgin land.”
Beverly Benzing said she is worried about potential utility rate increases.
“I don't want rates going up for our citizens, and I don't want to be dealing with a company that now can't handle it because of brownouts and rolling blackouts,” Benzing said.
Mobley said the center could turn down its operations during peak demand, as well as build a new substation as part of the project, increasing “overall power grid stability and reliability surrounding your township homes and businesses at zero cost to local taxpayers.”
But for now, there’s not an extensive track record for Crane to draw on. The company’s website lists three projects in active development, aside from the one in Oregon, and others in pre-development.
The Pierce Township proposal is one of the sites under active development, Mobley confirmed, despite the project still needing to clear both the zoning commission and then, the township trustees.
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