Ohio data center ban proposal closer to reaching November election

By David Beasley
The Center Square 

Leaders of a grassroots movement to ban data centers in Ohio are confident they can get the issue before voters in November.

The next step, after Ohio Attorney General certified the title of the proposed constitutional amendment, is gathering signatures from registered voters equal to 10% of the votes cast in the last gubernatorial election, and those signatures must come from at least half of the state’s 88 counties.

The group wants to stop the building of any more large data centers across the state.

Austin Baurichter, a lawyer in Brown County and one of the organizers of the effort, told The Center Square, he’s confident voters will get to decide this year.

“It’s going to happen,” Baurichter said. “I believe there are enough Ohioans that are aware of the myriad of issues that data centers bring with them including environmental and economic negative impacts.”

Baurichter last year moved with his wife and children from the suburbs of Cincinnati to Brown County. He was struck by the beauty of rural Ohio and alarmed there were so many data centers in the works, often without widespread knowledge of the residents there.

He attended a meeting of the Village of Mount Orab council in Brown County.

“That was actually the night that they did place a moratorium in place,” Baurichter said.

He met an attorney who was involved in the Mount Orab moratorium.

“It was through those discussions that we landed on the proposed amendment to the constitution,” Baurichter said. “To me, that was the most complete, ‘go big or go home’ move.”

 It also provides the most direct channel for Ohioans statewide to have a voice in the debate over data centers, said Baurichter.

“Ohio gets a chance to speak,” he said. “At the end of the day, that is the only thing that matters.”

The proposed amendment would only ban data centers that are 25 megawatts or larger, not the smaller centers.

“We want this to be reasonable and practical,” he said. “We understand that Ohio businesses need IT infrastructure.”

Bauricher believes that a proliferation of large data centers threatens to overload the state’s supply of electricity and water and cause many other problems, including destruction of valuable natural ecosystems.

The Ohio Manufacturer’s Association, however, disagreed that data centers are driving up energy costs. It points to utility companies who are using data centers as an excuse to raise rates.

“Ohio does not have a data center cost crisis,” the group said. “It has a utility-driven cost crisis. Utilities such as AEP have every incentive to inflate future demand, especially around data centers, because bigger forecasts can justify more infrastructure, more spending and higher.”The Clinton County Port Authority, in addressing concerns about water shortages from a planned data center Amazon Web Services plans to build in the county, said Ohio’s cool weather will keep water usage to a minimum.

“In this region, facilities will use outside air cooling approximately 97% of the year, eliminating the need for water-based cooling during those hours,” the authority said on its website.

The project will produce more than $1 million in new annual tax revenues annually, the authority said.

“The City of Wilmington’s population is projected to decline, raising concerns about declining tax revenues,” the authority said. “The infrastructure improvements and funds generated by this project are necessary to ensure that the City of Wilmington can continue to provide services to its residents.”

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