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Data center revenue cut county taxes
Local revenue
In Loudoun County the average taxpayer's property taxes went down because of all the data center revenue. A county in Louisiana was able to give teachers their first bonus in years for the same reason.
Terms of a good deal
The terms of a good deal include the AI company standing up net new power generation and paying for grid upgrades, which keeps electricity costs lower. The data centers recirculate their water, so they do not use an excessive amount of it, and they can be placed where they bother no one.
Polling and policy
A poll found that when people in these communities were walked through the actual upside, sentiment shifted by 30 or 40 points. Under a December executive order, data centers remain a state and local decision, so no community is forced to take one.
Why do data centers generate so much tax?
Virginia localities tax servers and other computer equipment as business personal property, and data centers hold billions of dollars of it. They also need few public services, because they employ few people and send no children to schools. Loudoun County in northern Virginia hosts one of the densest concentrations of data centers in the world. The county has lowered its property tax rate several times while data center revenue grew.
How do utilities protect other customers' bills?
Many utilities now use large-load tariffs that require big customers to sign long-term contracts and pay for most of their contracted power whether they use it or not. AEP Ohio's tariff approved in 2025, for example, requires data centers to pay for at least 85 percent of their subscribed capacity. The contracts let utilities build new generation and grid upgrades with the data center covering the cost.
How do data centers cool without much water?
Closed-loop cooling circulates a fixed volume of coolant through sealed pipes and sheds heat through heat exchangers rather than evaporating water. The same water is reused, so the facility draws only enough to fill the loop and replace small losses. Evaporative cooling, by contrast, consumes water continuously as it carries heat away.
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