ONEIDA TOWNSHIP, Mich. — Oneida Township has passed a six-month moratorium on data center development, giving officials time to create regulations for where and how these facilities can be built in the community.
- The township board unanimously voted to temporarily halt all data center permitting and approval processes
- Officials cite community concerns about noise, water consumption and power usage from these large-scale computer facilities
- The township plans to use the six months to write comprehensive laws governing data center placement and operations
The decision by the township board comes after residents expressed growing concerns about the potential impacts of data centers, which are large-scale computer infrastructure facilities increasingly built to support artificial intelligence systems.
WATCH: Oneida Township puts 6-month hold on data center projects to craft guidelines
"We had a farmer come in and say: they asked me if I wanted to sell my property for a data center, so we were alerted and we wanted to act right away," Oneida Township Supervisor Rick Jones said.
The moratorium blocks the permitting and approval process for any proposed data center facilities in Oneida Township. No data centers currently exist in the township.
“We unanimously voted to put a moratorium on data centers” said Jones.
Neighbors have raised concerns about the effects data centers could have on the community, including noise pollution and high water and power consumption.
The six-month pause will allow township officials to develop comprehensive regulations for future data center development.
"We can sit down and write a law about future data centers, where they can go, preferably industrial land and not farm land, and also any regulations we want about what they're doing," Jones said.
At the end of the six months, township officials hope to have legislation in place outlining where and how data centers could be established in Oneida Township.
"I think data centers are probably needed in this country but I think we need to be very careful about where they're placed because they're going to take massive amounts of energy, and massive amounts of water, and you can't put them just anywhere," Jones said.
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