Residents have been making their feelings on data centers clear on and off the campaign trail since the Denton City Council approved a second data center in January.
It’s a bipartisan issue shared across Texas and around the country, one that led Denton residents to pack the special called council meeting Tuesday night for one of two public hearings on establishing a data center moratorium.
The moratorium would pause development of new data center construction for 90 days so that council members can get a better handle on what they can legally do to honor the community’s wishes and ban more data centers from coming to Denton.
The council could extend the moratorium for an additional 90 days.
The next public hearing on the moratorium takes place Oct. 27.
“But for the moratorium, until it’s in place, people can still contact people, people can still try to find a way to place another data center here,” Mayor Chris Watts said Tuesday night. “I will tell you what you all have done tonight [is] you have sent a very clear message to the community, to us, that those aren’t the kind of conversations we want to have.
“It’s important to hear your voices. It also helps us. Because we’re up here trying to make decisions to better the community.”
The pause on data centers comes at a time when Core Scientific, the operator of the largest data center in Denton, has approached Denton Municipal Electric about leasing more public land to expand its operations south of its current facility.
“They did not tell us what it’s for,” DME Assistant General Manager Chris Lutrick told the council on Tuesday. “But what I do know is in the [power purchase agreement], they’re limited by their megawatt consumption. They have not got there, and those limits are controlled by ERCOT. They have not requested any additional power beyond what’s in the PPA.”
The power purchase agreement allows up to 391 megawatts with no “dimmer switch” to cut power usage when electricity prices spike.
Core Scientific originally leased 31 acres for a bitcoin mining operation in 2021 but then shifted gears three years later to focus on artificial intelligence. It received unanimous council approval in November 2024 to expand its operations and lease an additional 47.9 acres off of Jim Christal Road, near Denton Enterprise Airport.
“We are proud this city will be home to one of the largest GPU supercomputers in North America,” Matt Brown, Core Scientific’s chief operating officer, said in a 2024 email to the Denton Record-Chronicle. “We welcome locals into the Core Scientific family with the job creation this expansion is expected to bring.”
In 2021, DME estimated the expansion would lead to up to 300 jobs on site at above-average wages, but it’s not clear how many people have been hired. Whether the company is living up to its predictions is something council members will review if they approve the data center moratorium.
Core Scientific’s shift in operations did add roughly $3 billion in certified assessed property value to Denton’s tax rolls this year. However, it’s unclear if that additional personal business property value will continue, as Watts and council member Joe Holland pointed out last month during budget talks.
That increase in property value is the reason the council was able to lower Denton’s property tax rate by nearly 5 cents this year, from $0.595420 per $100 valuation to $0.548485.
“These businesses that are sometimes perceived as villains in our community — man, they’re carrying their weight and helping row their boat,” Holland told fellow council members in September.
Tuesday night’s public hearing was only the first step in a long process to address future data center construction.
The Denton Planning and Zoning Commission is holding a public hearing Wednesday about amending the development code on zoning districts that permit modular and warehouse data centers, as well as implementing use-specific standards.
Five years ago, the council approved amendments to the Denton Development Code that incorporated land-use regulations related to data centers.
Those regulations included specific-use permits for modular data centers — which are long-term storage of specialized computing systems and hardware in modular structures — in light industrial, heavy industrial and public facilities zoning districts. Warehouse data centers are permitted by right in general office, light industrial, heavy industrial and public facilities.
Warehouse data centers, intended for large-scale storage, are also allowed with a special-use permit in mixed-use regional, suburban corridor and highway corridor zoning districts.
“The City desires to amend the DDC in response to public concern and to adequately address and account for potential negative environmental and infrastructure impacts related to data center development within the City of Denton,” according to a recent staff analysis of the data center development code amendments.
Negative environmental impacts were among the reasons offered by community members Tuesday night for the council to implement a data center moratorium. Other reasons included strain on local resources and infrastructure, higher utility rates for residents and privacy concerns.
No one spoke in favor of data centers Tuesday night.
“Even if we could mitigate all of the environmental risks of a data center, we have to think about what these data centers are for,” a public speaker named Rachel told council members. “We’ve been promised all these amazing, miraculous things that AI can do with medical care or making our jobs easier.
“But what we’ve seen so far is mass surveillance, spying on citizens without warrants. What we’ve seen is the ugliest flyers [you’ve] ever seen in your life, and artists losing their livelihoods. We’ve seen students lose their ability to think critically and fail their classes and their tests and come out of school not having a quality education because AI is so fully integrated in what they do.”
Denton resident Josh Taylor reiterated what council members have said in the past, saying that a moratorium isn’t a permanent decision about the future of data centers in the city but instead an opportunity for the council to examine the implications of continued development.
Taylor said it offers the council an opportunity to ask difficult questions and help the community understand the long-term costs, as well as the potential benefits.
“What does it mean to actually listen to the people you were elected to represent?” Taylor asked the council on Tuesday.
“Data centers have repeatedly come up in conversations with residents, including during your own campaigns for office. These concerns being expressed tonight are not new, and they are not limited to a handful of people in this room.”
