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As data centers boom in Ohio, local communities are watching their water

The city of Marysville's reservoir holds more than a billion gallons of water. It's a resource that's seeing increasing demand, partially due to data centers.
Kendall Crawford
/
The Ohio Newsroom
The city of Marysville's reservoir holds more than a billion gallons of water. It's a resource that's seeing increasing demand, partially due to data centers.

A year's worth of Marysville’s water laps in a reservoir north of the city. Public service director Jeremy Hoyt said the water level normally sits above the dock, which now sits exposed to the sun.

“You can kinda see the staining,” he said pointing to where the stone wall changes in color. “We just have not been able to fill it with the drought.”

More businesses have come to rely on this 1.4 billion gallon reservoir in recent years. Hoyt said two data centers, south of the city in Jerome Township, are estimated to drink up around 10% of the central Ohio city’s daily water capacity. And, nearby, another Amazon data center plans to come online in the next couple of years. The city has planned for growth, Hoyt said, but they recently came to a realization:

We should start curtailing and limiting the use that the data centers have on our water system,” he said.

Ohio ranks fifth nationally in its number of data centers. Among the factors bringing businesses like Meta, Amazon and Google into the state, is a perceived abundance of water, which the centers need to cool their servers.

But as data centers move in, Ohio communities are grappling with how to promote growth while managing the finite resource.

How much water do data centers really need?

The data centers south of Marysville are just 2 of 191 in the state. That number has increased 10%, just from the start of the year, according to an analysis of data from Data Center Map.

Though each may cool their servers in a different way, most of the data centers require water. How much depends on its size – and who you ask.

The New York Times found a large Meta data center in Georgia used as much as 500,000 gallons a day. In northwest Ohio, the city of Lima inked an agreement to provide millions of gallons daily to an undisclosed data center. In Jerome Township, Hoyt estimates that one Amazon data center, on its worst day, uses around 350,000 gallons.

Ohio ranks fifth nationally in its volume of data centers, according to Data Center Map.
Data Center Map
Ohio ranks fifth nationally in its volume of data centers, according to Data Center Map.

But Dan Diorio, vice president of state policy with the Data Center Coalition, points to a yearlong study that shows the majority of Virginia data centers used less than 10 million gallons a year. The Virginia Joint Legislative Audit Commission found 83% of data centers used as much or less water than a large office building.

Right now, Ohio data centers’ water usage isn’t easy to pinpoint.

“In general, we don't have a good sense of what the water use footprint is of a data center,” said Helena Volzer, senior source water policy manager with the Alliance for the Great Lakes.

What are the challenges to managing our water?

That’s because data centers aren’t required to disclose the amount of water they use.

Less than a third of data centers track their water use at all, according to the Alliance for the Great Lakes’ report.

Data centers, like these pictured, can take up massive swaths of land.
Make More Aerials
/
Shutterstock
Data centers, like these pictured, can take up massive swaths of land.

Volzer wants Ohio to require companies to disclose their water usage. But, Diorio with the Data Center Coalition, said there are competitive and proprietary concerns with providing the data.

“Based on your water use, you can determine the type of technology used in the data center. You can also determine the level of [computing]. There's a lot of backwards math that can be done,” he said.

Volzer said more regional water demand studies are just as important. Her organization’s report found that 97% of data center operators connect to municipal water providers, instead of groundwater or surface water sources – making it difficult to see the bigger picture of water consumption across industries.

“It's hard for local decision makers to consider the broader environmental impact of the water resources … That's why some of these policies really need to be adopted at the state level rather than a piecemeal approach at the local municipal level.”

How is Ohio preparing?

The Mid-Ohio Regional Planning Commission (MORPC) conducted one such regional assessment of central Ohio’s water needs. They looked at water capacity opportunities and gaps across a 15-county region last year.

“Generally, we have abundant water to meet our needs,” said Edwina Teye, MORPC’s water and natural resources program manager. “Now if we add in industrial capacity or industrial needs, that would be stretching our capacity.”

Marysville's recently built a new water plant for the central Ohio city. It's already purchased additional land to expand.
Kendall Crawford
/
The Ohio Newsroom
Marysville's recently built a new water plant for the central Ohio city. It's already purchased additional land to expand.

To keep up with increased demand from booming industry, Teye said central Ohio will need more water and wastewater infrastructure and conservation strategies – like water reuse. That’s the process of using non-potable recycled water for industrial needs, like cooling data centers.

“That reduces withdrawals of fresh water that can be channeled to meeting our everyday usage, including drinking,” Teye explained.

Data centers are also innovating to reduce their water usage, Diorio said.

“These types of inputs are often some of the largest cost drivers for the data center industry. So the industry very much has a built-in incentive to be as efficient as possible across all resources,” he said.

How are local communities reacting?

Still, some municipalities are pumping the brakes.

Jerome Township, served by Marysville’s water system, passed a moratorium on data centers, citing safety and utility concerns. The village of Lordstown in northeast Ohio is considering an outright ban of data centers.

Hoyt, Marysville’s public service director, said his central Ohio city is not yet turning away data centers. Marysville is weighing both the economic growth a data center can bring and the resources it will use up.

If somebody wanted 20% of our capacity, but they're creating 20,000 jobs, that's a different conversation than if they're creating 100 jobs,” Hoyt said. “We try to look at it holistically, not just from the water perspective, but what’s going to be best for the community.”

Hoyt said it’s important that residents understand they’re not just going with the flow – they’re planning. They’ve already bought land for another water plant, in anticipation of increased demand.

Kendall Crawford is a reporter for The Ohio Newsroom. She most recently worked as a reporter at Iowa Public Radio.