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Data Centers: The New Next Door Neighbors in Prince George's County, Maryland
By Alexandra Farmer
Digital Justice Fellow
NCBCP TWD. Jr. Institute Hope and Justice Fellowship Program
The Shifting Geography of Digital Infrastructure
The Washington D.C., Maryland, and Northern Virginia (DMV) region is not just the hub of the federal government anymore; it is fast becoming a global digital infrastructure nexus. This transformation started with AOL in the 1990s, when Northern Virginia’s Loudoun County, famously named "Data Center Alley," permitted the development of data centers which now handles 70% of the world's internet traffic and has the world’s larget concentration of data centers. With Virginia already hosting 667 of these facilities, data center developers are now shifting their focus to Maryland. Developers are aggressively targeting the suburbs of Prince George’s and Montgomery (MC) County.
What exactly are data centers ? They are physical facilities that house computer servers and storage systems that process and transport digital information. These “supercomputer farms” provide for the extreme power demands needed for the use of artificial intelligence (AI). What is the critical issue about data centers? Data centers radically consume electrical energy and water, which forces residential communities to absorb the additional cost for these utilities and the industrial burden of an infrastructure that dramatically threatens their quality of life.
The conflict regarding the development of data centers in Prince George’s County is best demonstrated by the proposed $5 billion Brightseat Tech Park at the former Landover Mall site in Prinice George’s County, a complex slated to consume up to 820 megawatts of power. Community opposition centered on a severe lack of transparency, with residents feeling county officials approved the project without adequate public input or disclosure. At the heart of the protests are critical quality-of-life concerns: the facilities' constant mechanical hum and cooling systems that threaten to expose nearby residences to industrial noise levels up to 60 dBA, that significantly exceeds typical residential limits. Furthermore, residents protested the prospect of having to "exchange the fresh air we breathe for tax revenue," warning that pollution from the proposed data center’s continuous operation would impact respiratory health. There is also community concern that the massive energy consumption required for the data center would lead to higher electricity bills, forcing local ratepayers to subsidize the industrial demand. Finally, the county’s residents are worried that construction and continuous operations could degrade local water quality and complicate the maintenance of existing county systems. This push back from county residents led the county's Data Center Task Force to study the impact on ratepayers.
Virginia's Tax Success vs. Maryland’s Residential Burden
The core economic question for Maryland is whether it can replicate Northern Virginia's financial success without repeating its environmental strains. Loudoun County, Virginia, has generated substantial tax revenue, notably from the personal property tax levied on the vast amounts of the technology equipment used by data centers. This property tax has resulted in a remarkable fiscal benefit-to-cost ratio for Loudoun County that now receives $26 in tax revenue for every $1 spent on county services. This revenue stream is so significant that it has helped substantially lower the residential tax burden in Loudoun County.
While Prince George’s County’s proposed data center project is projected to generate high annual tax revenue and support high-wage jobs, the state’s ability to replicate Loudoun’s success is structurally challenged because the utilization of personal property taxation differs across Maryland counties. Moreover, Maryland offers sales and property tax incentives to attract developers, which may reduce the ultimate long-term revenue stream for Prince George’s County. Also, unlike Loudoun County, where high tax revenue offsets residential costs, Maryland residents face the Hidden Ratepayer Subsidy, which requires residents to absorb massive regional energy infrastructure costs, which threatens to increase residential utility rates by as much as 25%. This combination of residential utility cost spikes and potential erosion of neighborhood quality of life fundamentally undermines the fiscal benefits promised to Prince George’s County residents.
The Costs of Data Centers Burdens Those Who Can Least Afford It
The growth of data centers is not just a topic for policy debates.The amount of electricity and water that data centers require to operate places a demand on these utilities that increases their cost. These costs do not vanish, they are passed on to residential consumers’ utility bills. The development of data centers is driving up the cost of living for everyday families hitting Black and Brown communities in the DMV the hardest.
This rise in utility costs will be devastating to Black households that already bear a crushing "energy burden." A new national study from Binghamton University and California State University, San Bernardino, finds that Black households spend a far larger share of their income on energy compared to white households, even when income levels are the same. A similar study by Nature Briefing finds Black Americans experience energy insecurity and higher costs due to a combination of factors rooted in structural racism. The study highlights that customers in predominantly non-white communities often face higher electricity prices from utility providers while consuming less energy than white communities. This disparity is compounded by historical inequities like red-lining that result in poor housing conditions, such as older, less energy-efficient homes, which increase consumption and financial burden, thereby driving energy insecurity. For many low-income residents across the DMV area, this is already a crisis as SNAP-eligible households spend more than 20% of their income on energy bills, a financial strain that forces impossible trade-offs. Essentially, residents who can least afford it are being forced to pay for the tech sector’s increased power needs.
This financial burden on low-income Maryland residents is compounded by the passage of the Critical Infrastructure Streamlining Act (SB 474), which fast-tracks data center construction and exempts many high-pollution diesel backup generators from proper environmental review. Numerous environmental groups actively opposed SB 474, arguing this legal loophole directly undermines Maryland’s climate goals and deepens environmental inequity, allowing polluting industrial facilities to expand with limited public oversight..
Local Resistance: A Blueprint to Challenge Data Center Dominance The expansion of data centers in Prince George's County is the definitive moment of truth for the DMV, forcing a confrontation between tech corporate ambition and environmental justice. The passage of Maryland legislation which helped to fast-track the construction of data centers attracted investment in data centers but externalized the high costs of such things as localized pollution and utility spikes on to Maryland residents.
However, in response to overwhelming community mobilization, Prince George's County set an empowering example for the entire region. The County Council asserted local control, creating the Qualified Data Center Task Force and approving a temporary moratorium on all new data center applications through December 2025. This decisive action is a crucial bottom-up challenge to the state's economic strategy, proving that organized local resistance can demand strong best practices and guardrails that prioritize residential welfare.
Maryland stands at a crossroads. It can perpetuate Loudoun County's "Data Center Alley," model that privatizing profit while socializing utility and environmental costs onto diverse communities. Or, it can use community resistance to set a standard for sustainable digital growth.
For Maryland to fulfill its commitment to modernizing state services and enhancing digital access for its citizens, including the allocation of $129 million for critical state technology systems and $1.7 million for an Artificial Intelligence strategy, the state must mandate that data center operators fully internalize the true costs of their public utility demands and impact on the environment. The fight in Prince George's County is a necessary defense of local health and wealth, a fight that ultimately determines the true, sustainable cost of the global internet and ensures that, socially and economically diverse communities are not unfairly burdened by unchecked industrial expansion.
