MoCo environmental advocates urge passage of 18-month data center moratorium
Critics concerned about impact of facilities on climate, water consumption, ecosystem
By
Elia GriffinJuly 24, 2026 7:26 p.m.
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Following two data center decisions by Montgomery County Council committees on Wednesday, environmental advocates say they are grateful the county may have more time to craft regulations for the industry and are urging the full council to approve both when they meet Tuesday.
Caroline Taylor, the executive director of the Montgomery Countryside Alliance, told Bethesda Today on Wednesday that the moratorium will “forge a pathway forward to understanding better the sort of extractive nature of this industry and how Montgomery County might manage it.”
The council’s Economic Development Committee voted on Wednesday to recommend the County Council approve an 18-month moratorium on data center development. Later Wednesday afternoon, the Council’s Planning, Housing and Parks committee reviewed and voted to approve an amended zoning text amendment — also referred to as a ZTA — that blocks development of data centers larger than 25 Megawatts in the county.
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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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 of a plan to build a data center campus at the site of a decommissioned 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.
With heightened public awareness of the Dickerson data center project, some of the most vocal opponents to data centers in Montgomery County have been environmental advocates.
Their concerns about the facilities range from the impact data centers could have on the county’s climate goals, high energy use, impact on the surrounding ecosystem and water resources due to plans to use water from the Potomac River for cooling and noise from the data center itself.
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Taylor has long been involved in issues of data centers in the county. Before Wednesday, she said the fear for many environmental advocates was that the county would attempt to approach the data center issue on its own and without the coordination and guidance of biological and ecological experts.
“I’m hoping that Montgomery County, perhaps in tandem with other places in the country, can come together and really get this data so we know what we’re looking at and how we might manage,” Taylor said.
The Climate Coalition and Allied Organizations, a network of more than 30 groups advocating to protect the county from the potential harm posed by data centers, released a press statement following the council’s data center decisions on Wednesday, urging the council to pass a “comprehensive moratorium.”
Jorge Aguilar, the southern regional director for Food & Water Watch, a government accountability group, said in a statement that the moratorium is “commonsense” and pushed for the full council to vote in favor of the timeline.
“AI data centers threaten to increase pollution and run our utility bills through the roof. Big Tech’s land and resource grab is all in favor of corporate profiteering, not community benefits,” Aguilar said. “The people – not data center developers – need protections.”
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Karen Metchis, of the Montgomery County Sierra Club, said Wednesday that the county needs “thoughtful decision making” to manage the downsides of the data center.
“The data center industry is driving some very disruptive social change including over-running any possibility of controlling climate change,” Metchis said. “Data centers consume our water and energy resources in ways that are not sustainable and that our community cannot afford.”
Metchis added that the Sierra Club would work with the Council and County Executive to develop “transparent protections for our neighborhoods and our environment.”
Two energy standards advocates have voiced support for clean energy data centers and no use of diesel backup generators. Earlier this spring, residents rallied on the issue ahead of a county executive forum at the Silver Spring Civic Building and hosted by WAMU’s Politics Hour with Kojo Nnamdi.
Atmosphere plans to use diesel generators as backup power for the campus, which has raised red flags for environmental advocates because of the carbon emissions and air pollution they produce. According to Atmosphere, all of the backup diesel generators will have emissions control technologies, including selective catalytic reduction and diesel particulate filters.
Atmosphere has said it develops and operates the “greenest and most energy-efficient data centers on Earth,” with a focus on sustainable technologies and advanced cooling systems.
“While there are no publicly available plans as of yet to use renewable energy sources to power the campus, Atmosphere Data Centers notes that energy procurement is still in progress,” CEO Chuck McBride told Bethesda Today in April. “We are actively evaluating all available options to incorporate cleaner and lower-carbon energy solutions.”
According to McBride, the company was “founded specifically to rethink how data center campuses are designed and powered,” and its mission is centered on building campuses that “prioritize energy efficiency, advanced cooling systems, and lower overall environmental impact.”
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Originally published at Bethesdamagazine