Apex is facing a 190-acre data center proposal that would host four AI and cloud computing buildings, pushing hyperscale-style infrastructure into a residential-adjacent area.
Residents are most worried about power draw, with claims the site could consume 25–30% of the nearby Sharon Harris plant’s output, plus around a million gallons of water per day for cooling.
This scale of GPU and networking build-out would effectively front-run the town’s future electric and water capacity, raising questions about who gets priority for scarce infrastructure.
The developer, Natelli Holdings, is offering standard mitigations like noise control on cooling systems and generators, but that doesn’t address the core resource-allocation and siting issues.
Local officials admit data centers are inevitable and are now being forced into rapid policy-making on where AI infrastructure belongs and how it should be regulated.
Neighbors are pushing a broader argument that AI compute growth should not automatically overrule community planning, especially when utilities and subsidies are tilted toward large operators.
The upcoming January 22 planning meeting will matter for anyone tracking how local resistance and utility constraints shape the next wave of AI data center siting, so the link is worth a closer read.
