DeKalb County is weighing new data center land-use rules just as a 1 million square foot facility is proposed on a 95-acre site near homes and a school in Ellenwood.
The community pushback centers on classic AI-scale data center issues: massive power draw, generator noise, and water use concentrated in a residential, largely minority area.
Activists argue the draft ordinance is toothless, with no clear enforcement, penalties, or remedies, which matters when you’re talking about multi-decade, high-load infrastructure.
Residents say the project offers little local economic upside compared to the environmental and health risks of hosting energy-intensive compute, likely for cloud and AI workloads far removed from Ellenwood.
The uncertainty around who funds the project and when it might break ground highlights how opaque large colo and hyperscale builds can be at the community level.
Commissioners will vote December 15, with a town hall planned, so this is a live test of how local governments will regulate AI-era data center sprawl.
Worth a read if you track how siting, permitting, and community resistance will shape the next wave of GPU and cloud buildouts.
Source: Activists warn proposed Ellenwood data center could create ‘wasteland’ | FOX 5 Atlanta
