By Maurice Carter, Sustainable Newton Co-Founder & President

Effingham County residents were startled last month with news a $20B OpenAI data center project was approved by their local officials without public notice or any opportunity to comment. A story in Sunday's edition of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution recaps the events that led to the July 22 surprise announcement, with the goal of answering Effingham County residents who wondered "How is it that we didn’t hear a peep about this until it was already done?”

We want to answer the logical next question for our neighbors here in Newton County:  "Could it happen here?"  The answer is "thankfully not," but it could have turned out differently.
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As AJC reporter  Adam Van Brimmer explains it, 2024 updates to Effingham County's zoning ordinances allowed the OpenAI project to be approved by county officials without public notice.  "A push to modernize the county’s zoning ordinance resulted in data centers already being a permitted use a year before OpenAI first made contact," he writes. "A key element in addressing the antiquated zoning laws was the creation of a permitted use table. This tool established what could be built where 'by right' — meaning without significant review. The initial version was added to the zoning law in late 2024; the tables of uses ran for 10 pages. Data centers were on the list but drew little attention."

I testified Wednesday, on behalf of Sustainable Newton, in a virtual public hearing hosted by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), where I opposed rules changes EPA is considering that would effectively eliminate public notice and comment requirements in most air pollution permit proceedings.

The regulations EPA seeks to revise have been in effect under the federal Clean Air Act since 1973.  They require states to provide public notice and at least a 30-day comment period on pre-construction permits for new and modified stationary air pollution sources.  In Georgia, that process is managed by the state Environmental Protection Division (EPD).  Federally mandated  notifications from EPD are why Sustainable Newton and our partners at the Southern Environmental Law Center (SECL) and Altamaha Riverkeeper were made aware last November of applications for air permits filed by a Houston-based energy company, VoltaGrid, seeking to construct a methane-fired pop-up power plant to serve electricity for a data center on Hazelbrand Road being built by Serverfarm.  As allowed by law, we commented on the application in December and submitted comments again in March, raising issues with the draft permit EPD published for comment.

In June, Sustainable Newton, SELC, and Altamaha Riverkeeper sent aerial photographs and other evidence to EPD, alerting them to unpermitted emissions sources being constructed by VoltaGrid and Serverfarm -- in direct violation of state and federal law. EPD agreed, sending notices of violation to both companies and ordering VoltaGrid to stop work on "air pollution emissions sources and/or control equipment."  We've also since petitioned the Georgia Public Service Commission (PSC) to determine if VoltaGrid's electricity sales to Serverfarm are even legal in Georgia.

As I stressed in my testimony on Wednesday:

"None of this would have happened had Sustainable Newton and our partners not been notified through the New Source Review process presently required for minor sources. Nonprofits like ours rely on a transparent review process giving local communities an opportunity to hold polluters accountable.  Without that, people suffer."

When we last posted on June 29, Sustainable Newton had joined the Southern Environmental Law Center (SELC) and Altamaha Riverkeeper to file a complaint with the Georgia Environmental Protection Division (EPD) on June 25, alerting them to apparently unpermitted construction activity at the Hazelbrand Road site where Houston-based energy company VoltaGrid is building a methane-fired power plant to provide electricity to Serverfarm data center next door. 

On July 2, following their investigation, EPD issued a separate Notice of Violation letter to each company.  The letter to VoltaGrid included an order that "the Company must stop all remaining construction of air pollution emissions sources and/or control equipment until such time that an air quality permit is issued for the construction and operation of the Facility."  Serverfarm was allowed to continue work because EPD issued a permit for their 37 diesel backup generators on June 29.  However, both Serverfarm and VoltaGrid are required to respond with additional information with in 15 days and were told in the letter that "the Company is not relieved in any way from liability for civil penalties pursuant to Section 23 of the Georgia Air Quality Act by submitting the requested information."

Today, in a separate-but-related matter, Sustainable Newton and SELC petitioned the Georgia Public Service Commission (PSC) asking them to determine whether to investigate VoltaGrid's stated plans to generate and sell electricity to the Serverfarm data center to decide if they violate the Georgia Territorial Electric Service Act and the Georgia Cogeneration and Distributed Generation Act.

By Maurice Carter, Co-Founder & Current President

"Regardless of how you feel about AI itself, or the way that it's being rolled out, one thing is inescapable," says the narrator of a new PBS documentary. "Despite tech companies making promises about renewable energy and sustainable technology, much of this massive AI expansion is still being powered by fossil fuels."

We know. Because -- as we reported back in December -- a data center developer (Serverfarm) and an energy company (VoltaGrid) are partnering to install and operate 33 fossil gas-fired engines to power a data center on Hazelbrand Road in Covington. If you live here, this PBS Digital Studios Overview documentary We Saw What AI Data Centers Don't Want You to See is essential viewing.  In this episode, investigative reporter Evan Simon uses a drone fitted with a thermal imaging camera to expose the air pollution emanating from the Stargate Data Center in Abilene, TX.

Data centers are a hot mess!  Whether you're a big supporter or the most ardent opponent, you don't need me to tell you that.  There's every reason to want to slow things down, so it makes sense for the City of Covington and Newton County to put moratoriums in place, as they did recently.  But it's critical we use these timeouts to better understand the issues and the not-so-obvious solutions to some of the most vexing problems these massive facilities pose.

Concerns over soil and water impacts, noise and light pollution, heavy water use, electricity consumption, and air pollution, have communities across Georgia and the Southeast pushing back on data centers in their area.  Meanwhile, in the Georgia General Assembly, lawmakers are proposing a variety of bills meant to put guardrails around data center projects to protect Georgia taxpayers and ratepayers.

The concerns are many, but I am going to delve specifically here into issues around electricity demand:  including risk to ratepayers, grid reliability, and air quality concerns.  There are some emerging ideas we should be following.

This time of year, thoughts turn naturally to what to make of the new year ahead.  But perhaps I'm not the only one still struggling with what to make of the year just passed?  Has it really even passed?

It's been a tough 12 months for those of us committed to forging concern about the climate crisis into productive climate action.  It's not that we aren't making progress -- the trend lines and momentum on the clean energy transition are extremely positive.  But across the climate movement, we've been buffeted and battered by political headwinds emanating from Washington, DC, making every ounce of progress hard-earned.

Yet, I have faith the market advantages of clean energy (faster & cheaper than fossil fuels) and electric vehicles (beloved by their owners) will prevail.  Where our future feels less certain and our anxiety most intense is locally -- where a proliferation of data center projects stand poised to erase much of the progress our state and local community have made on improving air quality, reducing climate pollution, conserving water, and controlling growth.  The energy, water, and land demands of explosive AI data center growth are one of the biggest issues of our time, and we can't simply turn the page to a clean start.  Indeed, we've spent the closing days of 2025 joining other concerned organizations to inject some reasonableness into data center plans, while our Environmental Hazards Committee is working to surface all of the potential projects and assess the community risks of each.

All of this has me thinking not about new resolutions for 2026, but instead about an old resolution adopted -- but never fully operationalized -- by the Covington City Council for Earth Day in April of 2020.  First a little background, and then I'll explain the connection to our current data center crossroads in Covington and Newton County...