MoCo Council develops definition of data center for county zoning code
Decision followed advancement of 18-month moratorium on development of such facilities
By
Elia GriffinJuly 23, 2026 11:50 a.m.
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Montgomery County came one step closer to defining what a data center is in the county’s zoning code after a meeting of the council’s Planning Housing and Parks (PHP) Committee Wednesday afternoon.
The definition will give leaders a clearer path forward as they begin developing standards and regulations for the industry.
“We’re doing this because we truly love this county,” Council President Natali Fani-González (D-Dist. 6) said Wednesday during the afternoon committee meeting. “We’re going to take our time to make sure that the decision for a large data center is done the right way, in that we have the right setbacks and protections for the environment, for communities.”
On Wednesday afternoon, the committee reviewed and voted to approve an amended zoning text amendment — also referred to as a ZTA — aimed at defining large data centers and prohibiting such facilities throughout the county. Currently, a data center can fall under the cable communications facility category for land use but has never been defined in the county zoning code.
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According to the zoning text amendment, data centers are a “building or group of buildings, which has or is projected to have an aggregate monthly electricity demand of at least 25 megawatts (MW), used to house computer or network systems, computer storage equipment or computer servers to store, manage, process, and transmit digital data.”
In addition to defining a large-load data center, the ZTA also prohibits data centers from being located anywhere within the county at this time, according to council staff.
The PHP Committee’s vote 3-0 to approve the ZTA by the PHP Committee on Wednesday follows a decision earlier in the day by the council’s Economic Development Committee to advance an 18-month moratorium on data center development. The council initially weighed two moratorium proposals for six months and two years but ended up with a compromise that they say will still give them enough time to develop guardrails for the data center industry and do it in coordination with the state.
The full council is expected to vote on the moratorium bill and the zoning text amendment at its meeting on Tuesday.
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In a July 15 letter from Fani-González, Council Vice President Marilyn Balcombe (D-Dist. 2) and Councilmember Laurie-Anne Sayles (D-At-Large), the councilmembers said they “strongly believe that the ZTA’s common sense and context-specific standards will avoid some of the pitfalls plaguing other communities while embracing the economic and fiscal benefits, both direct and indirect, that these technologies bring.”
Fani-González also noted that county leaders are expecting to receive more information on data centers, their impact and best practices from county and state studies later this year. The additional information will help the county move forward as they tackle the data center issue and develop regulatory standards for such facilities.
Currently, the county’s Office of Legislative Oversight is working on a data center report that is expected to be completed in the fall, according to Fani-González. In addition, earlier this year the state enacted a law that spurred a study on data centers, called the Data Center Impact Analysis and Report.
In their July 15 letter, the council members also acknowledged that some issues related to data centers, namely energy and water use, go beyond the scope of a zoning ordinance and require coordination with the state.
“We’re going to be getting lots of information in the coming months,” Fani-González said. “And then we move forward as a county on the next steps, taking our time and continue to work with our community on how to do this right.”
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Councilmember Andrew Friedson (D-Dist. 1), chair of the PHP Committee, said Wednesday that the new moratorium timeline is an “opportunity to do the work” and is not a means to put “everything on hold” for 18 months.
“There’s a lot of work and a lot of questions and issues that need to be navigated through, and I think that work can start now,” Friedson added. “A lot of that work has already begun. … I think it’s important to recognize … that our intention collectively is to make sure that we have the time to thoughtfully go through all of the complicated questions that we have, but to continue the work and not stop the work from moving forward as this process proceeds.”
Calls for a moratorium and for the county to develop more stringent standards for data center development, particularly for large data centers, followed increased public awareness in the last year of a plan to build a campus of data center buildings at the site of a former coal-fired power plant in Dickerson.
The Dickerson site is owned by the Florida-based company Terra Energy, which in December 2023 filed an initial application to build the campus. Atmosphere Data Centers, a California-based company, has now taken over the data center development at the site and is seeking approval from the county’s Hearing Examiner to build out a five-building, 360-megawatt campus.
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Originally published at Bethesdamagazine