Senate data center hearing at Valley View largely touts benefits
Addressing the large crowd gathered midday Monday at the Valley View High School — a school district with the most data center proposals in Northeast Pennsylvania at five across its three towns — a panel of experts from across disciplines testified for just over three hours during a Senate Majority Policy Committee hearing, chaired by state Sen. Rosemary Brown, R-40, Middle Smithfield Twp., and state Sen. Dave Argall, R-29, Rush Twp., the chairman of the Senate Majority Policy Committee whose whose district encompasses Schuylkill, Carbon and southern Luzerne counties.
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Community members listen and take notes during the roundtable discussion regarding proposed data center developments at Valley View High School in Archbald on Monday, Aug. 11, 2025. (REBECCA PARTICKA/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)
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Senator Rosemary Brown speaks about data centers during the roundtable discussion held by the Senate Majority Policy Committee at Valley View High School in Archbald on Monday, Aug. 11, 2025. (REBECCA PARTICKA/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)
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(Left to right) Pennsylvania Chamber of Business and Industry's director of of government affairs Neal Lesher, president and CEO of Team Pennsylvania Abby Smith, president and CEO of Penn's Northeast John Aug.ine, Amazon Web Services Public Policy's senior manager Merle Madrid during the roundtable discussion held by the Senate Majority Policy Committee at Valley View High School in Archbald on Monday, Aug. 11, 2025. (REBECCA PARTICKA/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)
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Community members listen and take notes during the roundtable discussion regarding proposed data center developments at Valley View High School in Archbald on Monday, Aug. 11, 2025. (REBECCA PARTICKA/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)
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There are at least nine data center projects proposed across Lackawanna and Luzerne counties with three in Archbald and one project each proposed in: Blakely, Jessup, Clifton and Covington townships, Hazle Twp., Salem Twp. tapping into a nuclear power plant and Sugarloaf Twp.
Argall and Brown, who requested the hearing and solicited written questions from constituents, opened with remarks emphasizing the need for information on data centers. The hearing was neither for nor against data centers, but rather about education and uncovering updated factual information, Brown said.
'At the very core of this hearing is the question … 'Why? Why do we need data centers, and why is it so pressing?'' Brown said, pointing to the use of data centers in everything from online shopping to Google searches to ChatGPT. 'The question then jumps to, how do we provide and keep up with these demands? … How do we take advantage of the economic benefits while ensuring our power grid, our water supply, the environment, health and safety, security and the citizens are always protected at the highest level.'
For the next three hours, 19 subject matter experts offered testimony across four categories: economic development, energy and water resources, local impact and construction and workforce. They represented a broad range of industries, including Amazon Web Services and the data center industry, economic development agencies at the local and state level, utility companies, river basin commissions, Marcellus Shale and petroleum industry representatives, statewide municipal leadership organizations, real estate, education and construction unions.
The first speaker, Merle Madrid, the senior manager of public policy at Amazon Web Services, which is Amazon's cloud computing arm, quickly touted the tech and e-commerce giant's plan to invest $20 billion in Pennsylvania to expand its data center infrastructure to support artificial intelligence and cloud computing. Amazon announced data centers in Salem Twp. in Luzerne County, tapping into the Talen Energy nuclear power plant, and a second in Bucks County. Madrid projects the data centers will create at least 1,250 new, high-skilled jobs while supporting thousands of other jobs in the data center supply chain.
'There's a lot of talk when it comes to data centers, and rightfully so, about the energy and water needs. We understand that,' Madrid said. 'At Amazon, we're constantly innovating data center designs to reduce their impact on the environment and the community, and working to power them with carbon free energy and making them more energy and water efficient.'
Emphasizing the role of nuclear energy, in addition to the Talen power plant, Madrid said Amazon is exploring using small modular nuclear reactors at the facility.
John Augustine, president and CEO of Penn's Northeast, a Pittston-based collective aiming to promote new investments, jobs and business opportunities by promoting Northeast Pennsylvania, characterized data centers as the 'fourth industrial revolution,' following coal and iron as the second wave and warehousing and distribution as the third. He said his firm is working with or aware of at least 15 data centers in Northeast Pennsylvania, though he doesn't expect all to materialize. He pointed to financial incentives, like a large data center contributing $32 million a year in local economic activity and generating $9 million in state and local tax revenue.
Both Augustine and Madrid described technologies like quieter fans or more efficient liquid cooling to reduce noise and water demands.
Christine M. Martin, the president of PPL Electric Utilities, and Tony Nokovich, vice president of engineering at Pennsylvania American Water, both pointed to previous and ongoing investments into their infrastructure to position the utilities to address the water and electricity needs.
Martin said PPL currently has a system peak of 7.5 gigawatts of power, or 7,500 megawatts, with 14.4 gigawatts of data center loads under advanced agreement.
'That took us about 100 years to get to, so talking about roughly a doubling of our system peak in the next five to six years, which is obviously transformational not just to the commonwealth and the 29 counties (served by PPL) but also for our system to be able to serve that load,' she said.
For the first gigawatt of load in PPL's system from data centers, paired with an accompanying $100 million investment, Martin said it would average a 10% reduction in transmission charges for residential customers, with the first gigawatt being most impactful and every additional gigawatt implemented having added benefit.
She noted the potential need for more power lines to power the centers.
An average water-cooled data center could use up to 3 million gallons per day in the summer months, dropping to potentially 800 gallons per day in January, Nokovich said.
'These extreme demand swings present potential challenges to system design and operation,' he said.
Water utilities like PAW would have to construct facilities to satisfy the large demands, and the demand could require large transmission needs and storage tanks, with PAW positioned to manage the stress as it invests about $700 million into infrastructure annually.
Nokovich urged legislators that as they look at policy measures to streamline the growth of data centers, they should also consider water demand forecasting, infrastructure cost sharing, capacity agreements, alternative water sourcing mandates and operational resilience and demand management requirements.
'We are willing and encourage the General Assembly to work with us and other stakeholders to develop an impactful strategy to assist with the growth of data centers in the commonwealth,' he said. 'These measures, coupled with regulatory oversight, will ensure customers of Pennsylvania American will continue to receive clean, safe, reliable and affordable water and wastewater services.'
Others, like Patrick Henderson, vice president of government affairs and communications at the Marcellus Shale Coalition, stressed the importance of using natural gas to fuel data centers and the need for more pipelines to accommodate them.
Susquehanna River Basin Commission Executive Director Andrew D. Dehoff acknowledged the potential water-saving technology but said his colleagues in Atlanta, Texas and Virginia are in 'full-on panic mode' about how they'll meet water demands from data centers. Data centers can strain local water resources, as do the power plants needed to power the facilities. Power plants are by far the basin's largest consumer of water, he said.
It is critical to discuss water demands early into the site selection and design process, he said. Environmental sustainability needs to be the standard, not the exception, Dehoff said.
Holly M. Fishel, policy and research director at the Pennsylvania State Association of Township Supervisors, stressed the importance of local governments and their ability to balance the wishes of developers with residents. She criticized the push to fast track approvals.
'Faster isn't better if rights are trampled,' she said. 'To be clear, PSAT opposes any effort that would preempt local control of land use decisions.'
Other speakers continued to emphasize the economic benefits of data centers, the significant growth in workforce with high-paying jobs and the ability to retain local workers and the need for streamlined and easier-to-navigate permitting, among other discussions.
Argall concluded the hearing just after 4 p.m. by saying Monday's hearing is not the end of the discussion.
'This is the beginning,' Argall said.
Proposed data centers
Lackawanna County
Archbald
Wildcat Ridge AI Data Center Campus: An estimated $2.1 billion, 17.2-million-square-foot proposed data center campus spanning nearly 400 mountainside acres along Business Route 6 and Wildcat Road, or Route 247, in Archbald. The data center campus would consist of 14 three-story-tall data center buildings, each with a 126,500-square-foot footprint. The land was previously proposed for housing and commercial use.
Project Gravity: A data center campus that would be built on just over 186 acres between Business Route 6 and the Eynon Jermyn Road in Archbald, with entrances on both roads. Proposed by New York City-based Western Hospitality Partners, operating as Archbald 25 Developer LLC, Project Gravity would have at least six two-story data center buildings, each with a 135,000-square-foot footprint.
Archbald Data & Energy Center: A project to remove the Highway Auto Parts auto salvage yard on the Eynon Jermyn Road and build three data centers, each under 70 feet tall with a roughly 150,000-square-foot footprint, along with ancillary buildings and structures.
Blakely
Data center in Blakely: A newly proposed data center campus calling for four roughly 300,000-square-foot- total, two-story, 70-foot-tall data center buildings in Blakely off of Business Route 6 and Terrace Drive. The project is proposed to use 1.5 gigawatts of power. The site previously was going to have 40 single-family homes, plus townhouses and commercial space, but the developer changed those plans.
Jessup
Breaker Street Associates LLC data center: A nearly 1.1-million-square-foot, 130-foot tall data center facility off Breaker Street in Jessup near Hill Street, covering 131 acres and using 600 megawatts of power.
Clifton and Covington townships
1778 Rich Pike LLC data center: A data center campus spanning nearly 1,000 acres along Interstate 380 in Clifton and Covington townships, composed of an estimated 25-30 buildings, each up to three stories with about 125,000 square feet per floor. The project could use up to 1.5 gigawatts of power and would represent a more than $10 billion investment. Covington Twp. allowed small modular nuclear reactors to power data centers in its zoning, though the technology is not yet ready to be implemented.
Luzerne County
Hazle Twp.
Kansas City-based NorthPoint Development plans to construct 15 buildings and ancillary buildings between late 2026 and 2029 on 472 acres by the west side of Interstate 81 near the Humboldt Industrial Park. Project Hazelnut would create about 900 construction jobs and another 900 permanent jobs once the complex is fully operational.
Salem Twp.
Amazon plans to invest at least $20 billion to establish multiple high-tech cloud computing and artificial intelligence innovation campuses across Pennsylvania, with one of the first to be built in Salem Twp. Amazon had previously announced plans to build a series of data centers near Talen Energy's nuclear power plant in Salem Twp., having bought hundreds of acres of land around the power plant, and Talen Energy had sought approval to increase the amount of power the plant would directly supply to Amazon for the data centers. However, members of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission voted 2-1 against the proposal in November after a handful of electric utilities filed a complaint with the commission, asking it to hold a hearing to scrutinize Talen's interconnection service agreement with Amazon or deny the energy deal altogether. Still, officials appear confident in the plan to establish a data center campus.
Sugarloaf Twp.
LBT Investment Group LLC of Chicago wants to construct a data center consisting of six buildings all 200,000 square feet apiece and allocate 10 acres for electrical substations near Tomhicken Road.
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