Aurora City Council is set to vote on new regulations for data centers that come to the city. The meeting on March 24 aligns with the end of a moratorium the city placed on data centers.
Aurora has seen an increase in data centers. Last fall, the city placed a 180-day moratorium on development.
Alison Lindburg, director of sustainability for the city of Aurora, said the temporary moratorium was put in place to create new standards, ensuring data centers are responsible neighbors to Aurora residents.
“This way," she said, "the staff could take some time to understand what the best practices were about data centers, and to really listen to the public about their concerns about data centers.”
She says city staff did a lot of research, connected with other municipalities, and created multiple opportunities for public input throughout the six-month moratorium.
One major part of the proposed legislation is that data centers would be treated as conditional use, which means all new data centers would require city council approval. There would also be public engagement opportunities in this scenario.
Nine data centers are either in development or already constructed, and that’s before any potential legislation comes from this moratorium.
“Here in Aurora, we're trying to strike a balance,” Lindburg said. “We're trying to put regulations in place to help data centers that want to come here understand that we want them to be responsible neighbors, and to really be thinking about the future. Hopefully our residents believe that we've been putting in the legwork to try to do that.”
Besides noise, residents expressed concerns about high electricity bills, air and water pollution and massive water consumption. They also expressed concerns related to AI and a lack of transparency in the development process.
At the city council meeting, members will vote on a new four-part piece of legislation that touches on many of those concerns.
The council may also decide to extend the moratorium for 30 days.