Data Center Rezoning
Finding Answers and Creating More Questions: Our Best Estimates
Data Center Rezoning
Water Consumption
Based on readily available information for Google data centers and using equivalent per square foot consumption metrics, water requirement estimates are in the range of 398.77M* to 1,499.11M gallons annually, or 1.09M* to 4.11M gallons per day.
* Note these figures do not include the supplemental treated wastewater consumed by the referenced Douglas County, GA facility. According to the Georgia Department of Natural Resources – Environmental Protection Division, the Sweetwater Creek Sidestream Reuse Facility (aka the Sweetwater Creek Water Pollution Control Plant) located at 1565 Roberts Road, Douglasville, GA is permitted to discharge up to 3.0MGD (Million Gallons/Day) of treated wastewater. Excluding evaporation and other water volume losses, the minimum expected water discharge would be in excess of 3.46MGD given the increased facility footprint of 15.38%. This would also be the minimum number volume of water required for consumption.
What is the projected water consumption for the Patterson Farms proposed data center?
Sources:
Water consumption:
Google’s data centers use as much water as 41 golf courses. Here are the 10 thirstiest – DNyuz
https://dnyuz.com/2025/02/14/googles-data-centers-use-as-much-water-as-41-golf-courses-here-are-the-10-thirstiest/
Wastewater Discharge:
NPDES Permit# GA0047201
StreamDoc.ashx https://geos.epd.georgia.gov/GA/GEOS/Public/EnSuite/Shared/pages/util/StreamDoc.ashx?id=961189&type=PERMIT_FILLED_PDF
Facility Footprint (SQFT):
Lenoir, NC - Google’s 337,000SQFT data center located at 708 Lynhaven Drive, in Lenoir, North Carolina, consumed 336.8 million gallons of water in 2023 — as much as 2.2 golf courses.
Google Data Center in Lenoir North Carolina - https://www.datacenters.com/google-lenoir-nc
Douglass County, GA - 1.3M SqFt - Google’s data center located at 300 Riverside Pkwy Lithia Springs, in Douglas County, Georgia, consumed 345.6 million gallons of water in 2023 — as much as 2.3 golf courses. The report noted that the data center also used treated wastewater from the Sweetwater Creek Sidestream Reuse Facility. - Google Data Center in Lithia Springs, Georgiahttps://www.datacenters.com/google-douglas-county-ga
Water Reuse System:
Google shares its recycled water use in a green data center, 7 reasons why it is smart — Green Data Center Blog Time to Change
Google Data Center Gets Water Reuse System - Environment+Energy Leader
https://www.environmentenergyleader.com/stories/google-data-center-gets-water-reuse-system,19982
Google introduces first reuse water system in Ga.
Engineers often need a lot of water to keep data centers cool | ASCE
Data Center Water Usage: A Comprehensive Guide - Dgtl Infra
Data Center Rezoning
Town Water Supply
If by the Town of Mooresville:
Currently the Mooresville water and sewer infrastructure terminates at the intersection of Coddle Creek Hwy (3) and Sample Road. This is approximately 3.23 miles from the proposed data center location. A secondary service option is located at the municipal water and sewer facility on Johnson Dairy Road approximately 2.5 miles from the proposed site.
How will the water be supplied to the Patterson Farms data center?
Sources:
Public Utilities Information
https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/19217b36a97d45668d3b74fb1c09d847
Mooresville Town Limits Map
https://mooresvillenc.maps.arcgis.com/apps/Viewer/index.html?appid=f7d1049d07a4461d805a1f713d3b2cc0
Leading to Further Questions:
The following questions need to be addressed:
Will it be potable water, wastewater or a combination of the two?
What special considerations are the developer requesting to ensure adequate water supply if the primary or single source of water is to be supplied by the Town of Mooresville?
Will the data center be considered part of the city’s critical infrastructure, and if so what is the priority ranking compared with hospitals, fire, police, residential and commercial users? Justification for this question - Based on the Douglasville-Douglas County, Water and Sewer Authority (WSA) that services the Douglas County, GA Google data center via the Sweetwater Creek Sidestream Plant – The Google data center, ‘is part of the city's critical infrastructure which makes it a high priority to operate (Google gets to the top of the list after hospitals, fire, and police).”
Town of Mooresville Water Supply
As described in the Town of Mooresville Water and Wastewater Comprehensive Master Plan Executive Summary dated October 2021, the total raw water supply allocation from Lake Norman is 18MGD. The current Max Day Raw Water Demand is 12.4MGD. If this proposed data center is supplied exclusively with potable water at a rate of 4MGD, the allocation limit would be reached by 2031 for Max Day Finished Water Demand exceeding the 2050 projections. This indicates the water supply would be restricted during peak demand periods. Looking only at the Average Day Finished Water Demand, adding 4MGD of potable water would immediately exceed the 2050 projections by 400,000 gallons per day.
Douglas County, GA – Ongoing water supply expansions planned for the next 50 years growth are now projected to be depleted within 10 years.
The following questions need to be addressed:
What actions will the Town of Mooresville take to mitigate the water supply limitations? Options may include a building moratorium, water use restrictions, negotiating with Duke Energy to increase the supply from Lake Norman, expanding supply by drilling local wells, and/or piping in new water sources from outside the managed area.
If supply is increased from Lake Norman, what is the existing capacity of the water transmission mains that connect Lake Norman to the Town’s two water treatment plants and what infrastructure upgrades would be required to support any proposed increases?
What steps have been taken by the Town of Mooresville to assess the method(s) of increasing the water supply?
What funding will be required and how long will it take to implement the additional water supply?
What roadblocks and risks are associated with an increase of supply?
Source:
Mooresville planning
Comprehensive Master Plan Executive Summary
Demand outpacing planning
Georgia Welcomed Data Centers. Now It Needs More Power.
https://www.governing.com/infrastructure/georgia-welcomed-data-centers-now-it-needs-more-power
Data Center Rezoning
Ground Water Supply
How will the water be supplied to the Patterson Farms data center?
If by Subsurface Rights: Aquifer (Ground/Well Water)
Leading to Further Questions:
Is the site developer seeking approval to use groundwater for all or part of their facility’s needs?
What impact studies and ground water table data analysis has been completed, or if not completed, when it is planned to be conducted and results made public?
Has a coal ash to aquafer contamination study been conducted? Coal ash contains elevated levels of arsenic, cobalt, lithium, thallium, radium and other toxic cancer causing heavy metals. Within 6 miles of the proposed site 100,000 tons of coal ash is buried. The concern is this coal ash is within the impact radius should a high-volume well be permitted. At Duke Energy’s Allen Steam Station in Belmont, the coal ash dumps were built beneath the water table and are leaking cobalt (which causes thyroid damage) into groundwater at concentrations more than 500 times above safe levels, along with unsafe levels of eight other pollutants.
Will the rezoning require monitoring of any/all wells that are installed on the property as a condition of development and operation?
What is the underground capacity of water under and in near proximity to the proposed data center site?
What is the maximum sustainable extraction of water from the aquafer in terms of Gallons/Day?
What planning and water usage restrictions will be applied for varying levels of drought and water table stress?
What is the mitigation plan should the water-draw compromise the water supply to properties within proximity of the proposed site? If wells go dry or there is a reduction in volume and/or water quality rendering it unable to perform as it had prior to the data center, who is responsible for remediation? To what limit of repair? Based on recent data from similar industrial wells the aquafer level drop is as much as 15 feet and up to 19 feet near the extraction site based on 6.6MGD. Savannah Economic Development Authority is establishing a fund starting at $500,000 for mitigation within the impacted zone.
What is the regional water planning threshold for setting pumps and what is the proposed impact to existing wells?
What is the effective aquafer impact radius of a well(s) drawing 4MGD? Based on recent data from similar industrial wells the impact radius is as much as 5 miles.
Based on the comparable building footprint, the estimated water requirements for a data center of this size is equal to that of 8,000 to 40,000 single family homes. The existing buildable land within the proximity of the proposed data center and not subject to city water hookup has the capacity for less than a few hundred homes that would potentially sink wells for their primary water supply. Any proposed industrial scale wells drawing water from the watershed needs to be bonded with adequate protections for the existing groundwater users.
Sources:
Impact radius, comparative sized wells:
Hyundai, Port of Savannah impacting local water sources, report says
Wells near Hyundai's Georgia plant in Floridan Aquifer 'drawdown' zone
Remediation for unreasonable impacts due to excessive extraction of groundwater:
Hyundai, Port of Savannah impacting local water sources, report says
Aquifer level drop:
Wells near Hyundai's Georgia plant in Floridan Aquifer 'drawdown' zone
Coal ash contamination:
Mooresville area:
Potentially toxic coal ash buried under Mooresville day care | wcnc.com
Attorney asks EPA to dig into Mooresville coal ash contamination | wcnc.com
Coal Ash contaminating the aquafer – Belmont, NC:
National-Coal-Ash-Report-Revised-7.11.19.pdf
all-gwps-exceed-notice-aab-09-2024.pdf
Coal Ash contamination – Memphis, TN:
Who's Taking A Million Gallons of Water from Memphis A Day? Elon Musk.
https://www.thexylom.com/post/who-s-taking-a-million-gallons-of-water-from-memphis-a-day-elon-musk
Long burdened by a coal plant, South Memphis residents say no to coal ash in their backyard - MLK50: Justice Through Journalism
Data Center Rezoning
Water Storage Needs
Two to 5 days of water stored onsite and typically underground is not uncommon.
Source:
Engineers often need a lot of water to keep data centers cool | ASCE
Onsite Water Storage
How much water does the proposed project require for emergency supply outages?
Data Center Rezoning
Waste Water Infastructure
How much domestic waste water will need to be discharged from the proposed data center?
How will the waste water be managed?
As described in the Town of Mooresville Water and Wastewater Comprehensive Master Plan Executive Summary dated October 2021, the total design capacity of the water treatment plants (WTP1 and WTP2) is 18MGD. Using the 2025 Max Day Raw Water Demand of 12.4MGD and the projected water use increases stated in the summary, adding only the additional 4MGD to service the data center site would have the infrastructure at max capacity by 2031. There would be no opportunity to take either plant off line for maintenance or repair.
The actual available capacity of the two-plant system is less than the design capacity achieving only 15.5MGD until a Phase 1 rehabilitation of WTP1 is completed. The details and options of this are outlined in the Executive Summary. Highlights include:
WTP1 cannot be fully shutdown for Phase 1 repairs after the summer of 2024 where demand meets the WTP2 capacity of 12MGD.
Should WTP1 need to be taken offline, activation of an emergency connection would be required.
The bid was awarded on October 24, 2024 to J. Cumby Construction, Inc. and is currently construction.
Until the Phase 1 repairs are completed, the water treatment infrastructure is unable to support the additional water demands of a data center site as described. Available capacity would be 15.5MGD and demand would be 16.4MGD.
The following questions need to be addressed:
When will the Phase 1 repairs be completed?
When will the Phase 2 expansion of WTP1 to 8MGD described in the 20-Year Capital Improvement Plan be completed?
How will the Town of Mooresville expand the water treatment infrastructure to support the projected growth beyond 18MGD?
Town of Mooresville Water Treatment Infrastructure
Sources:
Capacity:
Comprehensive Master Plan Executive Summary
Phase 1:
Current Projects – Willis Engineers - https://www.willisengineers.com/current-projects/
Water Shortage Response:
Water Shortage Response Plan
Data Center Rezoning
Waste Water Capacity
How much domestic waste water will need to be discharged from the proposed data center?
How will the waste water be managed?
As described in the Town of Mooresville Water and Wastewater Comprehensive Master Plan Executive Summary dated October 2021, the Average Day Wastewater Flow for 2025 is 5.9MGD with a Max Day Wastewater Flow of 11.8MGD and a Max Month Average Day Wastewater Flow Forecast of 6.8MGD. Given the capacity details from the Public Utilities website, the existing infrastructure of the Rocky River Wastewater Treatment Plant located on Johnson Dairy Road is designed to treat 7.5MGD of wastewater (Max Month Average Day, MMAD). If we use the proportional wastewater discharge of 3.46MGD described earlier and add it to the Max Month Average Day Wastewater Flow Forecast of 6.8MGD for a total of 10.26MGD, we find that our discharge flow is now 36.8% over the water treatment capacity level and it exceeds the 2046 projections.
The Town of Mooresville is also contracted to receive up to 2.0MGD of wastewater from Troutman. For planning purposes the 2050 wastewater planning forecast only includes 1.0MGD. This assumption was based on Troutman reaching only 0.4MGD within the planning horizon.
Considering only the addition of the proposed data center wastewater discharge of 3.46MGD, the wastewater treatment plant would require 2.76MGD of additional capacity prior to the data center startup.
Infrastructure and growth recommendations within the Executive Summary:
Existing aging infrastructure requires repairs and upgrades.
The greatest need cited - An additional 5MGD in wastewater treatment capacity. Options are detailed in the summary with budget recommendations for years (2028-2032).
Flows from Troutman in excess of the 0.4MGD will require additional improvements within the wastewater collection system.
The following questions need to be addressed:
Why is the Town of Mooresville considering a rezoning decision for this parcel in the absence of sufficient wastewater capacity? Based on the Executive Summary, the required capacity will not be available until 2032 at the soonest assuming the recommended 20-Year Capital Improvement Plan is adopted.
Would it not make more sense to defer this rezoning or make it contingent on the availability of sufficient wastewater processing capacity?
If not, will permitting or a commercial certificate of occupancy of said parcel be held back until the wastewater infrastructure is in place?
What is the Town of Mooresville’s legal exposure should the rezoning be approved but the Town unable to provide adequate water and wastewater management to the site?
Is there a revised 20-Year Capital Improvement Plan or a formalized adoption to indicate that the wastewater capacity expansion is going to occur by 2032?
Town of Mooresville Waste Water
Sources:
Capacity:
Town of Mooresville Public Utilities - https://mooresvillenc.gov/government/departments/public_utilities/index.php
WW Expansion Analysis FAQ 091024.pdf
Capacity and infrastructure recommendations:
Comprehensive Master Plan Executive Summary
Data Center Rezoning
Waste Water - No Interbasin Transfer
How much domestic waste water will need to be discharged from the proposed data center?
How will the waste water be managed?
The Town of Mooresville does not have an Interbasin Transfer (IBT) Certificate. What is does have is an approved legacy IBT allowance of 9.54MGD (max day basis) based on the existing capacity to transfer water when the IBT Statute was first passed in 1993. Because the Town only has a legacy IBT allowance, any resulting certificate under the NC Statute will be treated as a new certificate.
The Max Day Water Withdrawl Basis and the Max Month Average Day Water Withdrawl Basis according to the Executive Summary are 10.3 and 8.6 respectively. The Max Day Water Withdrawl Basis is the point of reference for measuring the IBT compliance. Without any additional demand, the forecasted discharge for 2025 already exceeds the IBT allowance by 8%. If we add in only the discharge from the proposed data center site, the Max Day value immediately exceeds the IBT by 4.32MGD or 45.3% and the Max Month Average Day value exceeds the 2050 projections.
All of the wastewater is discharged into the Dye Branch, a tributary to the Rocky River, which eventually flows into the Pee Dee River.
Based on the data in the Executive Summary, additional capacity is needed immediately. This may come from infrastructure expansion only or it may also include state approval for an IBT. Considering only this single addition to the wastewater management burden, a minimum of 5MGD capacity needs to be brought online in advance of this proposed data center site becoming operational. The options are detailed in the Executive Summary, each with their benefits and cost describing how they would satisfy future growth. According to the 20-Year Capital Improvement Plan, the desired option is to secure the IBT as it is the least costly alternative.
Town of Mooresville - No Interbasin Transfer
Source:
Comprehensive Master Plan Executive Summary
Data Center Rezoning
Zoning and Land Use
The Future Character and Land Use map depicts the east side of Hwy 3 from just north of Hunters Creek Drive and all the way to the southern border of Iredell County and east to Rowan County as Rural Residential. This is the last remaining large tract of land within the county with this designation along with the narrow band of land that continues north and east along the Rowan County border.
This area is also designated as Peripheral Development, meaning state regulations applied within these areas limit the intensity of development to approximately two units per acre to account for impacts on important watersheds used and reserved for community water supplies in Lake Norman and the Ben T. Howell Reservoir in Kannapolis.
This area is also designated as a Tier 4: Low Priority Town Utility Provision, meaning that this is the last of the land that should be developed to avoid sprawl and to align with the forecasted growth over the next 20 years.
Why is this important?
The Mooresville area has been dramatically reshaped and reformed over the last 25-30 years with most of the rural residential land being converted into higher density planned development and conditional zoning. Most of the people who now live within the rural area have either been long-time residents, or they moved to the area for the peaceful and tranquil quality of life that this open farmland experience offers. As more housing is built following the dense planned community footprint coupled with their associated conveniences, the quality of life and that special place that we sought out and took up residence in fades until it is no more recognizable than the suburban sprawl that we left in the first place. The vision for Mooresville and the immediate area should be to protect and retain what little is left of this amazing landscape. To do less would be a disservice.
Data center financial impact on the community:
Republican PSC Chairman Jason Shaw regarding the evaluation of Georgia Power’s plans:
“The total of increased state tax collections resulting from construction and operation of data centers is not high enough to offset the forgone state tax revenue from the incentive,” the analysis found.
He said he’s worried they could drive up other customers’ rates, adding that, “We’ve got quite a bit of work to do to figure this out.”
Town of Mooresville - Zoning Map
Sources:
Future Character and Land Use Map:
Zoning and Land Use Map
https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/5921630578944e38a4df9c3425494099
One Mooresville:
How OneMooresville plan lays groundwork for town’s growth - Lake Norman Publications
https://www.lakenormanpublications.com/articles/how-will-onemooresville-plan-manage-growth/
Financial impact of data centers:
Georgia Welcomed Data Centers. Now It Needs More Power.
https://www.governing.com/infrastructure/georgia-welcomed-data-centers-now-it-needs-more-power