Summit Township officials are to be commended from taking a proactive approach to the possibility of data centers coming to the township in the future.

Last week, the township board of supervisors discussed drafting an ordinance that would establish the parameters that any future data centers in the township would operate underneath.

This is good public policy as data centers are spreading across the nation to feed an ever-growing demand for data storage, processing power and connectivity.

A data center is a specialized facility that houses computer servers, storage systems, networking equipment and other hardware needed for processing, storing and distributing huge amounts of data.

But data centers, as futuristic as they sound, bring present-day problems.

According to the University of Michigan Ford School for Science, Technology and Public Policy, data centers, because of their energy-intensive operations and cooling requirements, are rapidly growing consumers of electricity and water.

On average, according to the Ford School, a single data center can consume up to 2 megawatt-hours of electricity, which is roughly the equivalent power consumption of a small town. Data centers consumed more than 4% of U.S. electricity in 2023, with estimates suggesting that this consumption could rise to 12% by 2028.

To cool the equipment using these massive amounts of power, some individual data centers use hundreds of millions of gallons annually, dwarfing the usage of entire communities the data centers are within. Most facilities use over 10 million gallons of water annually.

That’s not counting secondary effects such as noise and light pollution caused by the data centers’ extensive all-night lighting and massive cooling fans which can disrupt both wildlife habitats and the sleep cycles of nearby residents.

Data centers require extensive all-night lighting and massive cooling fans, which can disrupt local wildlife habitats and sleep-wake cycles for nearby residents.

Supervisor Dave Barry said a visit to the east of the state showed him municipalities can’t stop data centers and their attendant problems without the proper ordinances in place. He said he hopes a future ordinance will help Summit Township have some control over problems that could come with a future data center.

Any recommendations the township solicitors come up with will be reviewed by both the township supervisors and the township’s planning commission before any ordinance is drafted.

It’s hoped the township moves quickly. As far as data centers are concerned, the future is now.

— EF