PINAL COUNTY, AZ (AZFamily) — The Pinal County Board of Supervisors voted down what would have been the largest data center project in Arizona, following opposition from residents over water and power use.
The site, planned south of Eloy, spans 3,300 acres. The developer, Vermaland, had proposed building 59 buildings and two gas-fired power plants. In response to opposition, the company scaled the project back to 11 buildings and one power plant, planned the facility several miles from neighbors, and pledged to use less water. The developer also brought in an economist to highlight the revenue the project would bring in.
The changes did not alter the outcome. The county board voted 4-1 against the project.
Board members explain no votes
Board member Jeff Serdy said he based his vote on public opposition.
“When 90% of the people are against it, I’m going to vote the will of the people,” Serdy said.
Board member Rich Vitiello said the project included too many unresolved questions.
“With too many ifs, maybes and buts, it’s hard to approve a project no matter what it is,” Vitiello said.
Both Serdy and Vitiello said the developer was building the project without an end user.
“I’m not against data centers, they need to be put in the right place where there is water and where there is power. And my constituents are not going to lose either one of those,” Vitiello said.
Vermaland argued the project would not require significant water use because the center would rely on a closed loop system.
How much water do data centers use
Kenneth Gillingham, a Professor at the Yale School of the Environment, studies the environmental impact of data centers.
“The old data centers before we reached this massive AI boom that we’re in right now were sometimes air cooled, they didn’t use much water at all,” Gillingham said.
Gillingham said new, large-scale data centers can use more than 3 million gallons of water a day, which he compared to the water use of a town of several thousand people.
Developers, including Vermaland, have proposed closed loop systems in response, in which water is cycled through and reused to cool computer chips. Gillingham said that approach uses more power.
“Think about all the energy that’s required to move that water through the pipes and to cool that water down,” Gillingham said.
“Is that really any better for the environment than using water? Well, it’s a tradeoff. In very water stressed areas you just don’t have very much water,” Gillingham said.
Gillingham said the power plants proposed for these projects are typically natural gas generators.
“These natural gas generators are just big generators that just generate electricity and natural gas they do emit some air pollutants as well,” Gillingham said.
Serdy said the Pinal County site was not using any water before the proposal, meaning a closed loop system would have still required more water than the site currently uses.
“Do you think the county has the water to sustain a facility like this? Right now yes, but will we in three to five years?” Serdy said.
Regulation questions raised
Vitiello questioned how water use tied to these projects could be tracked long-term.
“How do we regulate that? How do we watch that? We don’t own the water. So there’s just no way of telling,” Vitiello said.
Statewide data center numbers
Arizona has 160 data centers, the majority located in the Valley, with four dozen more under construction or planned.
Gillingham said data centers offer benefits tied to artificial intelligence but also come with costs.
“There’s enormous benefits that could come from AI but it comes at costs at the same time,” Gillingham said.
Gillingham said the growth of data centers has outpaced other major infrastructure investment in the country, and it remains unclear whether the current volume of projects is necessary.
“Do we even really need all of these data centers now?” Gillingham said. “Nobody knows the answer to that question. The growth of data centers has been phenomenal; it’s outstripped any other major infrastructure investment in our country.”
Gillingham said the cost of that infrastructure will likely mean higher power rates.
See a spelling or grammatical error in our story? Please click here to report it.
Do you have a photo or video of a breaking news story? Send it to us here with a brief description.
Do you have a story you want us to investigate? Tell us about it by contacting us.
Copyright 2026 KTVK/KPHO. All rights reserved.