VAN WERT, Ohio (WLIO) – A new data center is set to be built on the northeast side of Van Wert, according to Brent Stevens, Executive Director of the Van Wert Area Economic Development Corporation.
The approximately 220-acre facility will be located on the northern end of the city's “Mega Site,” north of U.S. Route 30 between Stripe Road and Mendon Road. The center will house various pieces of hardware and high-speed technology to manage and compute large amounts of data for companies. The name of the company and developer behind the project has not yet been made public, but an official announcement is expected soon.
The approximately 220-acre facility will be located on the northern end of the city's “Mega Site,” north of U.S. Route 30 between Stripe Road and Mendon Road.
“This is a developer, and data centers kind of do it this way where they bring in a developer. They have them put all the bits and pieces together, okay, make sure the power is there, all the phase one studies on the work, archeological, the endangered species, all that stuff is done, and that company, then, hands it off to the end user, okay? And so, that's what this is going to be doing here at the end of this month is to the closer with the developer. Then, the developer will name who their end user will be,” says Brent Stevens, Executive Director of the Van Wert Area Economic Development Corporation.
Some Van Wert residents have voiced concerns about the impact the data center could have on local water and electricity resources. Stevens addressed those concerns during a conversation with us on Friday.
“This particular company is looking at maybe 1.5 million gallons of water a day, but they are only going to take that from July and August, for the most part, when it's a little bit on the hot side. They would be responsible for that infrastructure buildup. On the energy side, it's a big project. I mean, we're talking about 500 megawatts. You know, people are concerned that rates are going to go up, and there's a couple of different ways that AEP figures that. Locally, they are not going to get affected anymore than the people in Columbus,” Stevens adds.
The project is expected to create approximately 250 new jobs.
