Indianapolis officials are standing up a new city-county committee to study data centers and propose fresh regulations, even as three massive projects already approved by Marion County officials remain exempt from the citywide pause on new developments. The group will dig into everything from public health impacts to generator noise and electronic waste disposal before any new zoning rules take effect.
The committee, backed by a total budget of $300,000, will be led by planning firm MKSK, according to WFYI. MKSK previously consulted on the Leap Innovation District in Lebanon, home to a $10 billion data center campus, and the Indiana University Environmental Resilience Institute will serve as the committee’s primary research partner. The Metropolitan Development Commission’s staff plans to consult outside experts and community members as the group builds its recommendations.
Marion County’s moratorium on new data center developments, approved by the City-County Council on August 10 and enacted by the Metropolitan Development Commission on August 19, runs through the end of 2027. The City-County Council approved $150,000 to fund the committee on September 19, and the Metropolitan Development Commission tacked on another $150,000 on October 7 to round out its budget, per the same station’s report.
Three Megaprojects Already Cleared the Pause
The moratorium will not affect the DC BLOX, Metrobloks and Sabey projects, all of which Marion County officials had already approved before the freeze took hold. DC BLOX’s campus sits in Warren Township, Metrobloks’ development is located in Martindale-Brightwood, and Sabey’s project is in Decatur Township, the station notes…