S. WHITEHALL TWP., Pa. – South Whitehall Township held special meetings of three township advisory entities to review a data center proposal Wednesday night at Parkland High School.

The landscape and tree commission, environmental advisory council and the park and recreation board examined the proposal known as Project Atlas which calls for the construction of three data center buildings, one administration facility, and one warehouse building for a 1.5 million square feet total over 410 acres.

Data center firm Edged is offering the project over three parcels. The parcels are located at 2493, 2747, and 2807 N. Cedar Crest Blvd. with additional right-of-way dedication along North Cedar Crest Boulevard, Mauch Chunk Road and Orefield Road.

Wednesday night’s meeting began with 90 minutes of public comment, followed by a meeting of each entity lasting up to 50 minutes, resulting in their formal recommendations concerning the project. None of the three entities recommendations constitute the project’s final approval or denial.

The proposal

Atlas’ campus will include site associated improvements such as internal access roads, employee parking areas, perimeter security fencing, landscaped buffers, stormwater management facilities, and a multi-use path. The campus is proposed to have 267 parking spaces. The existing site is primarily utilized for agricultural purposes with an area that contains bunkers and magazines used formerly to store munitions. The site also contains three homesites.

Project Atlas consists of three date center principal structures, each about 492,000 square feet. It also includes a 40,680-square-foot accessory structure and an existing cell tower.

Data center number one will have 47 parking spaces to serve its operations, while data center number two will have 50 parking spaces and number three will provide 50 spaces. As for the administration building, the developer has allocated 142 parking spaces, while the warehouse building will have 27 parking spaces.

Stormwater management for the campus consists of three wet detention ponds and one dry-extended detention basin. The three wet ponds will utilize spray irrigation equipment to manage the two-year, 24-hour storm and will contain aerator fountains to help prevent algae pond growth.

A new roadway is proposed running east-to-west through the site. This proposed roadway will extend from North Cedar Crest Boulevard to Mauch Chunk Road, with signalization proposed at the Mechanicsville Road and Mauch Chunk Road intersection.

Public water is proposed for the site, while a private septic system is being offered for sanitary wastewater. The plan also includes substantial building setbacks, berms, landscaping, and other screening measures along adjacent roadways and residential properties.

The property contains several historic resources, including a barn and two historic residences and farmsteads. Two of the historic structures are proposed for removal, while the barn is proposed to be restored and potentially dedicated to South Whitehall.

Additional infrastructure will include an onsite electrical substation and emergency generators at the data centers. The onsite electrical substation will be shielded visually from North Cedar Crest Boulevard via a 12-foot tall berm and plantings. The emergency generators will be surrounded by attenuation walls. These walls will minimize acoustic impacts on neighboring properties, according to the applicant.

The consideration

Among the items the landscape and shade tree commission considered was that the applicant is planning to clear about 72 acres of existing woodlands and reforest about 12 acres elsewhere on the property. About six acres of the reforestation is located within the area identified for public dedication as open space.

The EAC considered this same issue and a dedication of 26 acres of open space at the property’s eastern end by Mauch Chunk Road. The park and recreation board considered the requirements for open space dedication, open space areas and fees in lieu of land among other issues.

All three bodies offered many comments that will be memorialized and sent to the developer for their consideration. Some of those comments involved issues with the applicant’s proposed buffer zone, which the shade tree commission said could use additional detail. More details on vegetation in the plan was cited, as was a clarification on a 3-to-1 slope zone.

Other items noted collectively by the groups included questions as to why the applicant did not reduce the buildings’ footprints when they could have considered a multi-story facility. The project’s robust energy usage was also cited as an area where additional information and explanation is required. Other questions involved the cooling system, while another requirement was that the body wanted a full acoustic modeling report.

Another monitoring issue involved noise, an issue discussed at length by members and during public comment. The request is that the company would continuously monitor noise at least during the first year and not quarterly as suggested by the applicant. A more descriptive emergency response report was also requested as was additional information about who — the company or the township — is going to manage a proposed dedicated space. If it is the company, then the township would want a description as to how they would be accomplished.

The pitch

At a July 9 planning commission meeting Edged officials said the company pledged to pay for all power and infrastructure upgrades needed for the campus. The company is set to invest more than $8.9 billion for the project. This would result in a $99.5 million projected annual economic impact for South Whitehall, according to Edged officials.

Further, Atlas said it would pay $16.5 million annually in taxes. Money, they told planners and residents, which could offset years of projected tax increases from the Parkland School District.

Company officials portrayed the project as efficient and would enhance digital growth while conserving significant water amounts annually. They said the facility is designed with a closed loop system to cool their technology, like a car radiator.

The project would require 48 months of construction. A total of between 400 and 500 workers would be utilized for the construction.

Public comment

Individuals who spoke at the meeting’s outset provided offered negative project comments. Some voiced concerns about Project Atlas specifically and data centers conceptually. Armed with power consumption, noise complaints, water usage and a generalized anxiety about what artificial intelligence is doing to their lives, person after person expressed their distaste for the project and the physical infrastructure of the AI boom in general.

Some speakers offered generalized comments. One stated that corporations are not people, while another individual asked when will people stop destroying the environment for profit. Others expressed fear about what the data center’s impact would be on the next generation. One person said the data center would result in lower intelligence quotients and their death rates would be negatively impacted.

One woman used a cellular phone to play a recorded sound she said was noise omitted from a data center. Another speaker equated the noise to torture. Others said Project Atlas would cause increased heart disease and anxiety rates, and would foster troubled breathing and sleeping proficiency.

On the topic of artificial intelligence, one person said it posed an existential threat to humanity. Another individual claimed temperatures could rise by 16 degrees within seven miles of the project.

Finally, one speaker said data-driven decisions and not speculation should govern decision on data centers. She said there was inadequate information generally about data centers for South Whitehall to approve Project Atlas.

What’s next

The township’s planning commission is scheduled to review the project at a special meeting Sept. 23 at Parkland High School.