By Kyle Jackson
On June 15, Caledonia Township held a planning commission meeting to discuss the Data Center and Digital Mining Ordinance.
About half a dozen community members spoke out against data centers, while several more were in attendance to witness the proceedings.
The meeting opened with public comments, during which most people voiced resistance to the idea of a data center in Caledonia. Currently, there is no proposed data center.
“The overall consensus that I could find… is that they have been, to residents, causing disturbance to their communities,” said Melissa Cady, a Caledonia resident. “(It) seems to be especially true to communities within a mile of a data center.”
During public comment, Greg Comegys, a Caledonia resident and retired aerospace engineer, highlighted several issues he felt the planning commission should consider before approving a data center ordinance.
“I know we’ve talked about closed-loop cooling systems, but that’s only part of the problem,” Comegys said. “These mega facilities, if they use up to 100 megawatts, hours of energy, that’s also the amount of heat that has to be eliminated by the cooling system.”
Comegys continued to explain that, like a car, the heat would need to be removed via a radiator system that would likely be outside of the closed-loop system.
“If you take the 100 megawatts as an output from the cooling system that’s enough heat every hour to heat 3,400 homes,” Comegys explained.“That’s how much heat that is being released into the atmosphere.”
Comegys also brought attention to the potential increase in light pollution from a data center and potential lithium battery fires. He also suggested that quantum computing advances could soon make data centers obsolete, resulting in them sitting vacant in the future.
“In my mind, we don’t want to end up in a situation where we have three or four different players all wanting to build a facility in Caledonia Township,” Comegys said. “To me, it’s like a typical intersection where you got four gas stations. We don’t want a situation like that.”
After the public comments, the agenda continued with the consideration of special land use for an addition to a resident’s property, permitting the owning of livestock in a low-density family district, and reviewing architecture ordinance codes that exempt religious institutions from following certain ordinances.
After the primary agenda, the commission spoke on the proposed data center ordinance.
Caledonia officials previously approved a six-month moratorium that bans data centers in the township through October.
Donovan Visser, a member of the commission, urged his fellow members not to rush the decision until more details are given.
“For me, understanding that we can’t just say ‘no data centers,’ that’s just not a possibility,” Visser said. “So as we structure this, if we have some time to keep considering this, updating it, making sure we are where we need to be, and take our time… it makes sense.”
“I think I would feel comfortable giving us a little time, a month or two, to see what else we can gather in terms of information because it’s a big decision. Obviously, we all know that,” continued Visser.
The commission voted to recommend that the board of trustees extend the moratorium by a minimum of three months.
After the vote, the meeting was reopened for public comments.
John Crissman, a Caledonia resident, spoke, asking the commission to consider creating a citizen committee to help educate and inform local residents about the data center ordinance.
Crissman suggested that the issue be put to a vote on whether or not the community would want a data center.
Additionally, Crissman recommended that the committee wait until more is presented before lifting the moratorium.
Cady spoke again to the commission, highlighting her thoughts surrounding the zoning and impacts of data centers.
“I do think that they (data centers) should be moved to a heavy industrial zoning, and that should be looked into,” Cady said. “They have massive infrastructure demands, power consumption, noise pollution, and putting them in that heavy zoning would protect residents a little bit better from where those zonings are usually located.”
Cady also highlighted the possible impacts of building a data center so close to homes, using the center in Dowagiac as an example.
“The residents (of Dowagiac) have reported sounds emitted from the facility at the same levels being proposed in our ordinance. And they’ve had a severe negative impact on residents with constant 24-7 noise, buzzing vibrations, people with health issues are reporting an increase in their symptoms, an inability to enjoy outdoor activities in their yards, decreased home value because when they try to show their home, the noises are so apparent that people are not interested.”
Cady stated that the Dowagiac facility has failed to uphold the local ordinance. Due to the lengthy process of enforcing them, local residents are simply forced to deal with the fallout.
Residents who are within a mile of the facility have filed a lawsuit that can be accessed here. Cady gave a copy of the lawsuit to the planning commission at Monday’s meeting.
As of now, the moratorium stands unchanged.
