Data centers continue to be a hot-button issue across the country, and many Michigan communities have been organizing to push back against their development.
It's created a moment of political bipartisanship and brought people together across the ideological spectrum, as tech companies like Oracle, Open AI, and Google have sought to bring data centers into parts of Michigan in recent months.
In some communities, like Kalkaska County, the public pressure against a proposed data center has resulted in one company cancelling its plans to try and develop a data center.
However, there's one firm in the Saginaw Bay region that wants to keep pushing for data centers in Michigan. However, they want to ensure big tech supports and serves the communities they enter.
The Continuum is a firm dedicated to giving a "holistic and responsible approach to investment," with Bay County local Daniel Dimitroff leading the effort.
"If I had to tell you my sole mission in all of this it's not to go build a bunch of data centers," Dimitroff said. "It's to create moving, mattering, lasting social change."
One of the biggest concerns for people who oppose data center development is the amount of electricity and water they consume, bringing fears that utility rates will go up.
According to DataCenters.com Michigan already has over 40 functional data centers across the state. They're mostly the kinds that handle functions like data storage and internet servers, things that we need to have basic online functionality. Without data servers you wouldn't be able to use social media, email, or even read this article.
The new centers being proposed also support these functions as well as generative AI functions and automation services. Some of these are "hyperscale" models as well, which can range from hundreds of thousands to millions of square feet in size.
Dimitroff says if these centers are done properly then profits and tax revenue can be redeployed back into communities while addressing sustainability needs to protect natural resources and the land.
"We're actively modifying these and upgrading them as possible as you would expect technology firms to do," Dimitroff explained. "But finding the right partners and developers along the way that understand these can be built a little bit differently, in a smaller footprint and using sustainable materials, et cetera."
Plans include using a closed-loop cooling system to avoid pulling extra water and utilizing Michigan's colder months as a cooling method, Dimitroff said.
According to Dimitroff, giving big tech proper laws and regulations should result in economic benefits for communities, including ensuring people's rates are not affected due to data centers.
"If we do this the right way the redeploying of dollars better point to the ability to lower taxes lower utility rates," he said.
This would be done by working closely with local and state government officials to build an ecologically and economically healthy framework that could be used for data centers nationwide.
"I want to engage Michigan-based companies so that we can be as much the example as possible," Dimitroff said. "Because wherever we go, we need to be able to use the local labor, right? We need to be the example that we want to see in the world."
He says The Continuum does not want to be the group buying up plots of farmland for data center use. Instead, they plan to use plots marked for redevelopment and underutilized industrial spaces.
"[Big tech] just tries to make these things happen or force them into happening, right?" Dimitroff said. "Versus being a little bit more aware and saying state by state, what do we need? Community by community, what do we actually need? Because I don't think any state should have 100, 200 of these sites."
Dimitroff and The Continuum aren't the only ones who believe data centers could be used as a benefit for Michigan.
Jeff Jaros is the CEO of NTH Consultants, and is a member of Michigan for Responsible Data Centers.
"Technology is advancing, and so these data centers are going to get built. They will get built somewhere," Jaros said. "These facilities are needed. The question becomes why not Michigan? Why can't Michigan be a leader in this space?"
One benefit Jaros highlighted is the potential for Michigan to gain some much-needed tax revenue through the construction of data centers and beyond.
"These data centers take a long time to build. Certainly well over a year," Jaros explained. "You're going to have local engineering and local environmental firms that could be involved. You're going to have local contractors bringing being involved. That's going to put tax revenue into the community."
Jaros also mentioned how long-term businesses also pay various taxes that end up back into communities.
"You're talking about the potential for hundreds of millions of dollars in tax revenue in a state that could really use it," Jaros explained. "Because we haven't been growing with people. And so if we have the resource and we have the money, we can continue to fix our infrastructure. We can continue to fix our roads and bridges, right? And we can make Michigan a spot that attracts more people."
In some communities, the opposition against data centers has resulted in moratoriums being placed to put a pause on proposals and development.
One of these communities is Bay County's Monitor Township, where supervisor Terry Spencer says constituents are predominantly against the idea of allowing a data center in despite no active proposals.
"It's really difficult for a township that doesn't want to get involved in a lawsuit to say to any business 'well no you can't come here,'" Spencer said. "No township can make rules that they just can't come, and that's the same with any business that comes to an area anywhere in the state of Michigan."
According to Spencer, the purpose of a moratorium is to help create local regulations before they're built. Monitor Township's is for a year, but the duration of the moratorium is wholly dependent on a local governing body.
Michigan lawmakers are currently considering a bill package that would place a blanket moratorium across the state for a year to give time for these regulations to be created.
