The proposed Wildcat Ridge Data Center Campus could face direct public scrutiny Tuesday as people who have sat through hours of testimony on the sprawling development in Archbald may finally get the chance to speak.

Archbald will convene its eighth hearing on the project at 5 p.m. Tuesday. Council is considering an application to build 14 data centers with 588 diesel generators across more than 574 mountainside acres above Business Route 6.

Conditional use hearings for the 80-foot-tall data centers proposed above Archbald’s Eynon and Sturges sections have spanned more than six months. On Tuesday, the project’s Brooklyn-based developer, Cornell Realty Management, will have the opportunity to present rebuttal witnesses, and council plans to listen to additional public comment. Council previously allowed early public comment to winnow down a lengthy sign-up sheet of speakers.

Two days later, Archbald will hold its fourth conditional use hearing on the proposed Project Green Mountain, which seeks to build seven data centers east of the Casey Highway at the Stavola Quarry.

The hearing on Project Green Mountain is at 5 p.m. Thursday. Both hearings will be in the Valley View High School auditorium, 1 Columbus Drive, Archbald.

There are six proposed data center projects throughout Archbald totaling 51 individual buildings. Another developer plans to build two more data centers in the Valley View Business Park, but has not submitted an application.

Wildcat Ridge

Wildcat Ridge was Archbald’s introduction to hyperscale data center campuses. Representatives pitched the campus during a January 2025 council work session.

Council held its first hearing a year later on Jan. 28. The development faced early opposition from state Rep. Kyle Mullins, D-112, Blakely; Lackawanna County officials Commissioner Bill Gaughan; and Controller Gary DiBileo.

Scranton Mayor Paige Gebhardt Cognetti, the Democratic challenger for the U.S. 8th Congressional District, has also attended multiple hearings on Wildcat Ridge and signed up to speak during public comment.

Crowds of 600-plus people have previously gathered at the Valley View High School auditorium for hearings on Wildcat Ridge to hear testimony from its representatives, the Stop Archbald Data Centers movement and the borough.

The project is controversial due to its size and utility demands. Each of its two-story data centers would have a 202,340-square-foot footprint while seeking 1.6 gigawatts of electricity to operate.

To operate its data centers during a power outage or similar emergency, Wildcat Ridge would rely on 42 diesel generators per building, totaling 588 generators.

Diesel generators have emerged as a core concern due to their noise and emissions. Archbald’s zoning regulations for data centers exempt backup generators from noise restrictions during outages as well as routine testing and maintenance.

At a hearing July 13, Archbald’s noise expert testified that the generators, despite complying with the borough’s noise regulations during normal operations, would significantly affect the health, safety and welfare of residents when they run during outages.

“We’re talking about an increase in sound levels, though, that in my professional opinion, is unreasonable for the residents,” said J. Michael Spencer of JMS Acoustics LLC in Bethlehem. “I cannot think of one scenario in my entire 30-year career of consulting where I had that kind of a level of (noise) increase on a project.”

Wildcat Ridge’s proposed water demands would top out at just over 3.3 million gallons per day during the hottest summer weather.

The campus would also have 316,000 square feet of commercial space.

Project Green Mountain

Project Green Mountain’s parent company, Green Mountain 6 LLC, proposed Archbald’s sixth data center project when it filed a conditional use application in January.

Green Mountain 6 is linked to the developer of the similar Project Gravity data center campus on Eynon Jermyn Road.

The campus would be sited across an L-shaped tract of land on nearly 271 acres east of the Casey Highway. Each of its seven two-story, 65-foot-tall data centers would have a 138,000-square-foot footprint.

Though the project has faced scrutiny, its location aligns with the local push to keep data centers on the opposite side of the Casey Highway, distancing it from homes.

The data centers would use 525 megawatts of electricity based on a 75-megawatt-per-building estimate. It would have a total of 196 backup generators while using 14,000 gallons of water per day for domestic uses. The development’s project manager previously testified the campus would use a closed-loop cooling system that would be filled with trucked-in water every couple of years.

Archbald’s most recent hearing on Project Green Mountain on June 18 focused on a preliminary sound study for the campus that estimated its noise impacts.

The study projected it would comply with Archbald’s daytime residential noise limits, even with all of its generators running during an emergency. However, attorney Justin Richards of Elliott Greenleaf PC in Wilkes-Barre, who represents residents opposing data centers, challenged the projections as “at the very margin” of what Archbald allowed, giving them little leeway if they were louder.

Council initially scheduled the fourth Project Green Mountain hearing for July 13, though the borough rescheduled it at the request of the developer.

The borough announced the new hearing date Thursday in public notices published in The Times-Tribune on July 21 and 28.