In the month since Fisk University announced a $1 billion campus master plan set to include a 70,000-square-foot data center in North Nashville, and one week since additional details came to light regarding another data center planned near the Nashville Zoo, there’s been a great deal of community outcry.
Residents come out in droves to Planning Commission meeting to support crackdown on tech facilities’ operations
Mayor Freddie O’Connell weighed in Monday, issuing an executive order putting the “full weight of the Metro government” behind efforts to pause the development of large-scale data centers. Such centers often power AI usage, consume large amounts of water, generate heat and contribute to pollution. O’Connell says he would like to expedite a proposed 90-day moratorium on data center construction that is still making its way through Metro Council. The mayor is also encouraging the examination of infrastructural, environmental, economic and community impacts of the proposed centers.
“We don’t want the potential negative impacts of large-scale data centers in our neighborhoods, so in partnership with the Metro Council, we’re taking action to ensure we put proper regulations in place before any more of these things are proposed,” says O’Connell. “With this executive order, we’ll work with Metro departments and the Metro Council to ensure Nashville remains a place where our residents’ health and safety always come first.”
In his order, the mayor calls on the Metro departments of codes, health, planning, transportation and water, as well as Nashville Electric Service, to “evaluate the potential impacts of large-scale data centers within Nashville and Davidson County.”
Rep. Justin Jones is joined by health experts and community leaders in speaking out against the university’s proposed innovation center
Alumni and neighbors of Fisk — a historically Black university in North Nashville — have expressed concern about the 30-megawatt center planned for the campus. In addition, as first reported by the Scene last week, a proposed data center next to the Nashville Zoo may be larger than initially reported. Pushback from public figures including Brad Paisley has brought national attention to the zoo-area proposal.
District 20 Metro Councilmember Rollin Horton has noted that the Fisk and South Nashville data centers would not be isolated concerns — data centers are popping up all over the country. Elon Musk’s enormous 150-watt XAI center in Memphis has been met with resistance due to air pollution. Horton is sponsoring a bill that would put restrictions on the kinds of data centers permitted in Davidson County, banning especially large data centers and limiting where smaller data centers can be built. The legislation would also cap air pollution emissions and noise level. A recent Metro Planning Commission meeting was packed out with community members who spoke out against the construction of such data centers.
Find the full text of O’Connell’s Executive Order No. 59 below.
