CHESAPEAKE, Va. (WAVY) — The Chesapeake Planning Commission is getting ready to discuss a proposed data center in the Great Bridge region of the city Wednesday night.
The proposed 350,000-square-foot facility would be Hampton Road’s first industrial scale data center, but many have argued that Virginia as a whole already has enough data centers — some even calling it the data center capital of the world.
Virginia is the data center capital of the world, what’s the controversy surrounding them?
In April of 2024, Governor Glenn Youngkin, a supporter of the data centers, stated $2.2 billion of wages are paid to Virginians with its data center ecosystem. He also stated the centers have brought over $1 billion in tax revenue.
“That funds an immense investment in schools, public services and social services,” Youngkin explained…