The number of counties who are placing moratoriums on data centers is growing in Iowa, and also Nebraska.
As some companies work on plans to launch data centers, some of the Northwest Iowa counties who have placed moratoriums in the month of June included Woodbury, Plymouth and Sioux counties.
In Nebraska, 11 counties across the state already have moratoriums in place. Four more counties are considering moratoriums as placeholders until they can draft data center specific regulations.
Nebraska Public Media News reached out to all 93 Nebraska counties, asking about current and future data center regulations. Of those that responded, 27 counties either recently updated their comprehensive zoning plans, are about to update their regulations or are in the process of doing so.
Gage County people in mid-June lined the walls of a packed courtroom in Beatrice, in a four-hour Planning Commission meeting. The commission then recommended an 18-month moratorium, which will soon go to the county commission.
Attendees who spoke were worried about the environmental impacts of data centers, such as the water and electricity needed to supply them.
“The people that are putting the data centers in, they don't really care about Gage County,” Wanda Garrett of Beatrice said. “They don't care what happens to Gage County. They don't care about the water, the environment or the people that live here. Their whole purpose is to make money so that they get wealthier, not Gage County.”
The only person who spoke in opposition to the moratorium was Eli Waring, an associate developer at Tenaska. The energy company is helping build the Google data center near Interstate 80 in north Lincoln.
Also, in South Dakota, on July 1, the so-called “data center bill of rights” went into effect. It requires data centers to pay for increases in utility rates they cause and also spells out local control on data center ordinances.
