Port Washington approves annexation, zoning to pave way for proposed 3.5 gigawatt data center
The City of Port Washington has annexed part of a Town of Port Washington site where a 3.5-gigawatt data center campus is proposed.
At the Common Council's May 20 meeting, officials approved ordinances to annex around 562 acres, rezone it under the city's new technology campus zoning district and account for the project in the city's comprehensive plan.
Cloverleaf Infrastructure, the Houston-based firm that acquired the land and permits for the project, previously revealed plans to complete a first phase of development by 2027 on those 562 acres, which represents almost 30% of the entire 1,900-acre site area under contract for the campus. The rest of development is planned for completion by 2030.
The company that will eventually occupy and operate the site has not yet been named, though Cloverleaf Chief Development Officer Aaron Bilyeu has said this announcement will come shortly after annexation. After the meeting finished, Bilyeu declined to provide the long-awaited answer just yet.
Before the annexation and zoning plans arrived at the common council, they were reviewed by the city's plan commission in April. Annexation was also reviewed by the state's Department of Administration, a necessary step prior to approval, according to the city's Planning and Development Director Bob Harris. The department determined it to be in the public's interest, he said.
A few local residents of the town and city spoke at the meeting, urging city officials to responsibly steward the project with consideration of its environmental impacts, intensive energy use and potential use for artificial intelligence, a technology they say could have negative consequences.
Town resident Caleb Tydrick said the city should receive assurances from any potential end user that the technology, in part, subsidized by taxpayers is not resulting in undue harms, such as using AI for weapons.
Tydrick also expressed concern that Wisconsin policy and utility infrastructure isn't yet prepared to ensure the new energy generating assets built to power the campus – and others proposed in the state – prioritize clean energy and protect regular consumers from price increases.
So far, plans for the massive campus include 11 data center buildings and five substations. These buildings would house thousands of interconnected computers linked to the outside world through fiber optic cables to power most modern online services, like social media, video streaming, cloud storage, banking, air traffic control and, increasingly, AI tools.
Cloverleaf has said it's already working with We Energies to bring 1.3 gigawatts worth of power-generating assets onto the grid by 2027 for the first phase of the project, around 30% to 40% of which would be renewable, according to the firm.
Also by 2027, American Transmission Co. is planning to bring a new high-voltage power line to the site.
At this early stage following the announcement, it is unclear whether the end user intends to change any of these plans, though more details will be hashed out in a development agreement between the end user and the city.
More details about the project's final form will hinge upon ongoing and future negotiations between the end user, We Energies, Cloverleaf and American Transmission Co., with oversight from the city, the Public Service Commission and the Department of Natural Resources.
Some of those critical decisions include whether Lake Michigan water will be used for cooling the energy-intensive servers, how to address the campus' localized environmental impact, what new energy assets will be built to power the project and how potential plans for AI might affect the general public ― all concerns expressed by residents near the site who are following the proposal closely.
Wisconsin is already home to over 40 data centers, according to a data center industry mapping site, though the vast majority are several magnitudes smaller in size and energy use compared with the Port Washington proposal.
That total is likely to increase and new proposals will likely be on the larger side of the scale, as state officials are positioning Wisconsin to capitalize on the burgeoning AI and data center industries.
Already, they're working to clear the path for this project and other current and future data centers in the state by removing limits on tax incremental financing districts that could be used to help finance these projects.
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Port Washington approves annexation, paving way for proposed data center
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