The Local Battles Over Data Center Developments in Wisconsin

Frederica Freyberg:
A large-scale data center in the village of DeForest was rejected this week. It’s an example of the push-pull between local communities and tech companies, with their ever increasing demands to store and process huge amounts of data, especially in the age of artificial intelligence. As Steven Potter reports, opposition from DeForest residents left the village board with a difficult decision to announce.

Jane Cahill Wolfgram:
Some of you might feel very victorious tonight. Others are feeling a great loss.

Steven Potter:
When residents in the DeForest area first heard that a large-scale data center was being planned for farmland just outside their village, they were not happy about it.

Nancy Roth:
I picked this spot 40 years ago to live because it was so remote. I never thought we’d be faced with something like this.

Steven Potter:
Nancy Roth was one of the residents who opposed the sprawling 1600 acre and $12 billion development proposed by technology company QTS Data Centers. They worried that the data center may damage natural resources and tear apart the tranquility of their rural landscape.

Nancy Roth:
We want to live in a farming community, not next to a concrete walled data center.

Steven Potter:
So Roth and others went to work. They organized residents, printed yard signs, created an online community, and voiced their opposition at numerous town and village board meetings. And just this week, after months of expressing their outrage.

Jane Cahill Wolfgram:
We’re at a point where we can finally make a vote.

Steven Potter:
Those opposed to the DeForest data center were able to claim victory when the village board voted unanimously against the QTS data center plan.

Alicia Williams:
Yes, to reject. Thank you.

Steven Potter:
With that rejection of the proposal from the village of DeForest, QTS has now formally withdrawn from the project. This kind of conflict, which hinges on the local control of land and resources, has been repeating itself around the state. Here’s what happens. A large-scale data center gets proposed. Residents get upset and voice their opposition. And then local officials take notice of the outrage and put an end to the project. Or the data center company itself decides to pull out. Other proposed data centers that have been nixed recently include one in Brown County and another in Racine County, and the city councils of both Menominee and Madison have passed restrictions on data centers being built there.

Tricia Braun:
The data center industry, especially at this scale, it’s new, right? And any time there’s something of this magnitude that’s new, it’s scary.

Steven Potter:
Tricia Braun is with the Wisconsin Data Center Coalition, which advocates for these developments to boost the state’s economy. She says that our ever-growing need for more information, more entertainment and more innovation, including and especially with the use of artificial intelligence, is what’s driving demand.

Tricia Braun:
Whether you’re on your phone, your live streaming TV, you’re a manufacturer that’s automating your processes, you’re a regular company that just decides to move its server offline or to the cloud, all of that needs to be stored somewhere. That’s where data centers come in.

Steven Potter:
Some large-scale data centers house only one company, which is the case for the Beaver Dam Data Center being built right now by Meta and the Microsoft Data Center, under construction in Mount Pleasant. But Braun says smaller and midsize companies are clients, too.

Tricia Braun:
Whether it’s insurance companies, financial institutions, just general businesses can be some of these tenants. When it comes to something that is changing this fast and as you know, we’re all doing more with technology every day, the demand is increasing.

Steven Potter:
According to research from the Brookings Institute, there are more than 5,000 data centers operating in the United States. That’s ten times more than any other country. There are around 50 data centers here in Wisconsin, at least for now. But if technology companies get their way, there may be several more of them here soon. And some of them will be the hyperscale sized data centers that span hundreds of acres and cost billions of dollars. Data center companies find Wisconsin appealing because of available land, energy, and a favorable, particularly cooler climate. Currently, data centers are being proposed in Rock County, Ozaukee County, Wood County, and Kenosha County. And although QTS withdrew its bid for DeForest, the company says they may explore other locations in Wisconsin.

Ryan Hunter:
I think digital infrastructure is critical to our economy and critical to national security, and it has to get built somewhere.

Steven Potter:
State lawmakers are also getting involved in data center regulation.

Mark Born:
We need to be competitive in this space.

Steven Potter:
Mark Born, a Republican in the state Assembly, represents Beaver Dam, where social media company Meta is building a $1 billion, 700,000 square foot data center.

Mark Born:
This is the future and why shouldn’t Wisconsin communities benefit from some of the economic development that comes from that?

Steven Potter:
While he is in favor of these developments, Born also wants to make sure that data centers don’t lead to higher electrical bills for local residents and that the state’s water supply is protected. He’s a lead author of legislation that aims to regulate data centers.

Mark Born:
Ratepayers should be protected. We should be protecting our natural resources.

Steven Potter:
Democratic state Representative Angela Stroud of Ashland says the Republican bill doesn’t go far enough. She wants to see more rules around renewable energy, fees and labor. And if data center developers don’t meet those requirements…

Angela Stroud:
That means a project may not be well suited for the state and I think we should be willing to admit that and say, “Fine, then we’re not the place for you.” But if we can achieve those things, which we can with smart regulation, we need to get something done.

Steven Potter:
Regulation is a sticky topic for data center proponents.

Tricia Braun:
I think we have to be very careful about what is put into place as far as rules, restrictions, regulations to make sure that those unintended consequences aren’t an overall detriment to future development.

Steven Potter:
While the future of data centers in Wisconsin remains a case by local case situation, proponents say the need for more and more computing power and data storage is undeniable. But for now, it remains an exercise in compromise between data center developers, local residents, municipal government and state lawmakers. Reporting from DeForest, I’m Steven Potter for “Here & Now.”