Cumberland County is on track to impose a six-month moratorium on construction of data centers on Monday, a temporary ban that would run until December 15.

The Board of Commissioners voted 5-1 on Thursday to put the proposed moratorium on the agenda of its Monday meeting. If approved, the moratorium would start immediately. When the ban expires, commissioners intend to have in place regulations on how data centers can be built in unincorporated areas of the county.

Commissioner Marshall Faircloth cast the only “no” vote. Commissioner Jeannette Council was absent. Faircloth told CityView on Friday that six months “is too long for local government to interfere with private business” and he favored a three-month ban.

The public can provide feedback on the proposed moratorium in person during the public comment portion of the meeting on Monday. People may register in advance to speak via the county website. And they may also sign up in person within 15 minutes of the beginning of the meeting, which starts at 6:45 p.m. in the board meeting room on the first floor of the Cumberland County Courthouse.

Comments may also be emailed.

Enough Time to Create Regulations?

Data center projects have spread across the country and state to support the nation and world’s rapidly growing demand for electronic records storage, computing power, cryptocurrency mining, and artificial intelligence networks. 

The county’s moratorium aims to halt data center construction while the county staff and Joint Planning Board research and write proposed regulations for these projects, and present them to the public. The regulations would be to ensure that when data centers are built in Cumberland County, they don’t create problems for the rest of the community. 

At a time of rapidly rising electric rates, the facilities require vast amounts of power. As communities fight over dwindling sources of drinking water and worry about water pollution, data centers need water for cooling. Noise from the data centers’ cooling systems drones throughout some communities, as North Carolina Public Radio has reported. Municipalities and counties around North Carolina have passed moratoriums.

At least two data centers are reported to be under consideration for Cumberland County. Fort Bragg is also seeking one.

County Commissioner Glenn Adams asked whether six months is enough time to produce the regulations ordinance. It is enough time, Assistant County Manager Heather Skeens said.

Commissioners held public hearings on data centers in March and in May. The Fayetteville City Council recently voted to hold a public hearing on data center regulations on August 10.

Meanwhile, the N.C. General Assembly is considering enacting a law that would regulate the projects.

Details of Cumberland’s Data Center Moratorium

If enacted, the county data center moratorium would:

  • Halt county planning staff review of site plans for data centers, and halt the zoning and building permits for them.
  • The moratorium ordinance defines data centers as facilities that house computer equipment and systems “used for remote storage, processing, or distribution of massive amounts of data needed for cloud services, internet applications, and artificial intelligence workloads.”
  • The definition does not include businesses with data processing equipment whose use is “incidental and subordinate” to their primary operations, and merely support the operations.
  • During the moratorium, the county is to talk with electric utilities to learn their capacity to supply data centers, and how electricity rates may be affected. Also, county staff and officials may visit data centers to learn more about them.

Senior reporter Paul Woolverton can be reached at pwoolverton@cityviewnc.com.

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Paul Woolverton is CityView's senior reporter, covering courts, local politics, and Cumberland County affairs. He joined CityView from The Fayetteville Observer, where he worked for more than 30 years.