Local residents are revolting against a $100 billion Utah data center project backed by Shark Tank’s Kevin O’Leary that would use more electricity than the entire state does in a year.
Commissioners in Box Elder County—a rural county of just under 60,000 residents in the northwest corner of Utah—unanimously voted to advance the 9-gigawatt project last week, even as a crowd of people gathered at the county fairgrounds to protest and demand more information.
Residents are concerned, among other things, about the facility’s 40,000-acre footprint—roughly the size of Washington, D.C.
The meeting grew unruly and one commissioner told the audience to “grow up” before the elected officials went to a private room to approve the project while attendees watched on a livestream, CNN reported.
Following the vote, a small group of residents filed an application seeking to put a referendum on the ballot to stop the project, the Salt Lake Tribune reported. The Box Elder County attorney is reviewing whether the application is viable. If so, the effort would still require more than 5,000 signatures from residents across the county to be put to a vote, the outlet reported.
