Charlotte leaders concerned about noise, environmental impact of proposed data center

CHARLOTTE — A 2.5-million-square-foot data center could be coming to University City. As Charlotte City Council considers the project, the staff is declining to endorse it over noise concerns. A single-family neighborhood sits to the south of the project site.

PowerHouse wants to build on more than 130 acres between Interstate 485 and University City Boulevard. PowerHouse is a subsidiary of the DC-based firm AREP. The data center expects to employ 15 to 30 people with an average salary of $134,000. PowerHouse is interested in the site because of its proximity to a Duke Energy substation and its connectivity. City staffers aren’t endorsing the project due to concerns about its noise.

Collin Brown is the attorney representing the project and says he has taken residents on a tour of the Meta data center in Forest City to hear what it sounds like. He says they were surprised to not hear anything disruptive. He says the modern data centers aren’t as noisy.

“We had some folks say, ‘What does it sound like?’” Brown said. “If you go down the Google hole, it’s not the noise that’s a concern, it is the humming. In new facilities, there is not humming.”

“In many markets, you will see monolithic concrete boxes for data centers, but we take great pride in our design,” developer Greg Rowes said.

The city plans to research this further and wants to know about the project’s environmental impact. Data centers can use hundreds of thousands or millions of gallons of water a day to cool their servers.

The data centers also use an immense amount of power.

Councilmember LaWana Slack-Mayfield says these are inquiries worth launching. She is also concerned about the potential impact on people who live nearby.

“For me looking at this, this seems like something that should be in an industrial area, not around residential homes,” she said.

The developer is offering to take city leaders to the Meta data center to hear what it sounds like. Charlotte City Council could vote on the project as soon as next month.

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