As the proliferation of AI-related development continues to be a political football across the country, Jersey City has taken steps to ensure that new standalone data centers aren’t proposed within their borders.
During their June 30 meeting, Jersey City’s Planning Board approved changes to its land use development ordinance. The language in the changes removes cyber hotel and data center as an allowable use in the city’s industrial district while also revising the definition of warehouse to clarify the exclusion of data centers.
Jersey City’s industrial districts are focused mostly along the Hackensack River and the southern area of the Greenville neighborhood.
The changes were initiated by the administration of James Solomon and passed the Planning Board by a unanimous vote. Any existing data centers will be grandfathered in under the changes.
Jersey City has a limited number of data centers, with all the currently built ones existing within office buildings as part of the larger development. According to a city-created report, there are five data centers in Jersey City and all of them date located Downtown.
The city’s existing data center components are in mixed-use towers at the addresses of 25 Christopher Columbus Drive, 210 Hudson Street, and 1 Evertrust Plaza. The development at 111 Town Square Plaza additionally contains a pair of data centers.
The move in Jersey City comes as many New Jersey towns are banning data centers amid concerns about electricity bills, demand for water supply for cooling requirements, noise, and other quality of life issues.
More than 80 data centers are already in operation in New Jersey, according to South Jersey Climate News. There are more than 4,313 data centers operating across the United States, with Virginia leading the way with a total of 609 centers.
