Data centers are racing for land and power, from federal desert to Colorado suburbs
The Trump administration is quietly pushing public land for AI data centers, even as a Colorado county approves one over resident objections about water and power.
What happened: Two data-center land fights broke out at once. The Interior Department told Bureau of Land Management state directors to find public land for AI data centers within three days, and Secretary Doug Burgum has held a string of meetings with tech and energy executives about siting them, according to the Washington Sun. Separately, Weld County, Colorado commissioners voted 5-0 to approve a 41-acre Global AI data center near Windsor, reusing a vacant former Kodak/Carestream plant, over hours of resident objections about water, electricity and noise.
Why it matters: AI data centers need huge amounts of land, power and water, and both the federal government and local governments are being asked to hand it over fast. BLM has lost nearly half its staff under Trump, with some state land offices at 50% vacancy, yet it's now a top priority to clear technically complex sites for a technology the agency has little experience reviewing. Meanwhile Colorado communities are split: some counties have imposed moratoriums on data centers while Weld County approved one and Colorado Springs weighs another next week.
How it works, plainly: On federal land, BLM is supposed to balance many uses under a public-benefit mandate, and any data center needs an environmental review under the National Environmental Policy Act, reviews the agency may lack staff to do well. Locally, Weld County required a special-review permit, and Global AI got a utility 'will-serve' letter for 35 megawatts, though critics note it only guarantees three years of power and doesn't say how it reaches the site. Conditions included closed-loop cooling, a roughly 65-decibel noise cap, and a decommissioning bond.
The rollout: The first BLM-approved data center, near Boulder City, Nevada, was already halted by a judge for reusing an old solar-project environmental study instead of a fresh one. Other federal sites are earlier-stage, including groundwater testing near Silver Springs, Nevada, and a proposed park-land swap in Virginia. In Colorado, Global AI's first 27.5-megawatt phase could go live this year on the way to a stated 1-gigawatt network goal by 2029, while a congressional bill seeks to ban data centers on federal land entirely.