What Is the Impact of Data Centers in Northeast Ohio?

Northeast Ohio ACM's focus for the upcoming year will be on Data Centers in Northeast Ohio. A data center is a physical facility or specialized building that houses an organization’s critical IT infrastructure, including servers, data storage systems, and networking equipment. These centers store, manage, and process data for applications, websites, and cloud services, acting as the backbone of the internet. These new data centers are called "HYPERSCALE". A hyperscale data center differs from a traditional data center in size. A hyperscale data center needs a physical site large enough to house all associated equipment, including at least 5,000 servers and quite possibly miles of connections, so it can encompass millions of square feet of space.
A single hyperscale facility requires between 100 and 650 megawatts (MW) of power, enough to supply power for 80,000+ homes. These centers will be connected to our electric grid, which will increase energy costs. They consume millions of gallons of water for server cooling. The demand for chatbots (and other purposes that may not be evident to the public) is driving the construction of centers across the country.
There are many plans to build new centers and retrofit "no longer in use manufacturing plants" for this purpose.
NEOACM has decided to investigate these plans and inform our communities in the Northeast about the impact these centers will have.
JOIN US for an “in-person” meeting on Saturday, April 11th, at 2:00 - 3:30 PM at the Newport Public Library. Please RSVP.