#KevinOLeary’s Massive #DataCenter Project in #Utah Gets the Greenlight, Locals Are Furious

The project would be more than twice the size of Manhattan and could consume more electricity than the entire state currently uses.

By Bruce Gil
Published May 6, 2026

"The Box Elder County Commission voted on Monday to move forward with a proposed 40,000-acre #AI and #CloudComputing campus in a rural part of northern Utah near the #GreatSaltLake. The site would span more than twice the size of Manhattan.

"The project, backed by O’Leary Digital, the infrastructure arm of O’Leary Ventures, is expected to eventually produce and consume up to 9 gigawatts of power. That’s roughly double the amount of electricity the entire state of Utah currently consumes, according to The Salt Lake Tribune.

"The campus is expected to be built in phases and overseen by Utah’s Military Installation Development Authority (#MIDA). O’Leary proposed a similar project in Canada in 2024 and has referred to both developments as '#WonderValley.' "

[...]

"For his part, O’Leary has claimed, without evidence, that much of the opposition to the project was 'paid' and that the meeting was filled with 'professional protestors.'

" 'We think that over 90% of the protestors are actually not people that live in Utah or Box Elder County. They’re being bussed in,' O’Leary said in a video posted on X.
He also claimed backlash on social media surrounding the project was AI-generated.

"O’Leary Ventures did not immediately respond to a human-issued request for comment from Gizmodo."

Full article:
https://gizmodo.com/kevin-olearys-massive-data-center-project-in-utah-gets-the-greenlight-locals-are-furious-2000755168

Archived version:
https://archive.ph/Q9tF4

#OLearyDigital #OLearyVentures #SharkTank #Datacenters #AIDatacenters #LocalOpposition #NoisePollution #AISucks #MilitaryIndustrialComplex

$64B of data center projects blocked or delayed amid local opposition

https://www.datacenterwatch.org/report

#HackerNews #dataCenters #localOpposition #projectDelays #techIndustry #infrastructureChallenges

This is NOT the first time #SearsIsland has been targeted with a destructive energy project! Tell #GovernorJanetMills to build the #WindTerminal on #MackPoint, instead of Sears Island. There is federal funding available, so there's NO REASON to be CHEAP (Mills has balked because #Maine would have to clean up #industrial #pollution at Mack Point -- which should be cleaned up anyways!

"The possible industrial development of the island has been a point of controversy for many years. Writer #EBWhite (#CharlottesWeb), a resident of nearby Brooklin, Maine, noted in a 1975 essay for the New Yorker that he had attended an evening forum about a #CentralMainePower Company proposal to construct a #NuclearPower plant on Sears Island. White reported to New Yorker readers that the Central Maine Power Company 'feels very good about nuclear generating plants, is not worried about #radiation or accidents.' [Or rise in sea temperature from heated wastewater causing environmental damage, apparently]. In response to a goat farmer, their spokesman acknowledged #radioactive 'iodine can contaminate milk... [b]ut he was cheerful about the prospect. You would simply put the animals on a controlled diet, he said, and after about forty days the radioactivity would be gone.' [#Hormesis anyone?] Facing #LocalOpposition, the plant was not built."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sears_Island

#Environment #EndangeredSpecies #ProtectSearsIsland #WindTerminal #SandDunes
#Searsport #ProtectWahsumkik #Wahsumkik
#EndangeredSpecies #ProtectTheDunes #GovernorJanetMills #WabanakiAlliance #Wassumkeag