TOWN OF LERAY, New York (WWNY) – A Central New York real estate broker says the town of LeRay is the perfect location for a data center, and it’s already being marketed to find a buyer and developer.
Thousands of acres in the town of LeRay on County Route 16 near Evans Mills are being marketed for a data center. The proposal includes hundreds of acres for a massive campus of buildings and potentially its own solar energy.
Allen Olmsted, owner and real estate broker at Canaan Realty, whose company is marketing the land, says the proposal would be more efficient than other data centers, which are facilities that house the infrastructure needed for the data that powers a phone, laptop, or artificial intelligence.
“We don’t want to see it continue to suck a million gallons of water a day, or 300 megawatts of power a day,” Olmsted said.
Sustainable approach proposed
His goal is to make data centers more sustainable by minimizing water usage and using a private energy source.
“We can’t just stop data centers, but we certainly can do better,” Olmsted said.
Reasons he thinks a data center is a good fit include new energy infrastructure recently installed by National Grid, double fiber optic access and its proximity to Fort Drum.
Olmsted says if the army post gets its own nuclear energy, he hopes some of that could be used for this sort of project.
“The Janus Program at Fort Drum would be amazing, if we can tie into that. Small modular reactors. Great technology, and that to me is going to be the next generation of how data centers don’t consume so much of our resources from the local community,” Olmsted said.
Town considering moratorium
Olmsted has talked with town of LeRay officials. The town may be considering a six-month moratorium on data centers to get an understanding about projects like this, and officials want to hear from residents.
“I need to talk with the town board, obviously the planning board, and our attorney to see the direction we’d need to go,” said Lee Carpenter, town supervisor.
Albany is also looking into a three-year moratorium statewide on data centers.
“We’re not taking a position on them one way or the other. We’re just saying we think there’s a way to do it responsibly, and we will ensure that conversation is advanced,” Assemblyman Scott Gray said.
Olmsted says the data center wouldn’t be catered specifically to AI, and he’d work with any company that shares his values.
“I’d love to see New York state say, ‘We’d love to champion something like this that can be very environmentally friendly, net-neutral, as close as you can get,’” Olmsted said.
Gray says if Fort Drum gets nuclear energy, it’s unlikely it will be shared off-post. He says companies that would use up a lot of energy could bring in their own power generation.
St. Lawrence County project reviewed
In St. Lawrence County, the planning board reviewed site plans for a proposed data center in the town of Massena on Thursday night.
Those at the meeting say Bitcoin company NYDIG wants to build three new structures, the smallest of which is 400,000 square feet, which is twice the size of Potsdam’s Walmart. It would use about 635 megawatts to power all three. Renderings show the structures being built near the former Alcoa East plant.
Planning board members discussed power consumption, water usage, and other issues related to the project. They recommended approval with a list of conditions needing to be met.
Links to those meetings can be found here.
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