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SLOW DOWN
The coverage of the March 23 Sangamon County Board meeting by Dilpreet Raju was thorough and thoughtful (“County Board votes to table data center proposal,” March 26). Given how complex and extensive this issue is, both locally and nationally, it is understandable that it did miss one key issue.
The electric cooperative RECC and CyrusOne continually state that our utility rates will not be increased with a 600-megawatt data center in Sangamon County. However, areas saturated with data centers do show a dramatic increase in utility rates. The PJM utility grid, which is saturated with them, is considering requiring them to provide their own energy. It also needs to be explained how the MISO grid, or any grid, is required to respond when it is faced with multiple companies applying to install multiple hyperscale data centers.
To give a rough comparison, if someone goes to several car dealerships and has their credit run at each dealership, it skews their credit capacity. Corporations such as Amazon, Meta and Blackrock (40% owner of CyrusOne) are in a race to build as many data centers as they can. This means multiple speculative applications to see what will stick. It is a scattershot approach that confuses and distorts energy-demand planning.
The MISO grid is required to treat these potential builds as actual builds, creating a picture of excessive energy demand coming online with not enough energy on hand to supply it. A door opens for ratepayers to cover the expense to bring expensive fossil fuel plants back online to meet the hyperscaler’s needs.
It is up to us to slow down this rush. We need to look to other ways to build out solar by using non-agricultural areas such as rooftops, highway medians and parking lots as untapped resource. And why are we sacrificing what ground we have gained in clean energy? These companies are more than able to carve out responsible ways to grow, but only if we stand up to them. No amount of money is worth desecrating a peaceful existence or this beautiful ecosystem that is gasping for breath from our abuse. Let’s work together to keep them accountable.
Anne Logue
Springfield
PEOPLE OVER PROFIT
It takes a strong leader to have the courage to protect their constituents from long-term impact rather than settling for short-term profits. Putting peoples’ well-being at risk for non-binding promises is reckless, just as developers like CyrusOne are recklessly flooding the country with data centers, heedless of the damage they leave behind.
It’s easy to say yes to promised tax revenues and jobs. It takes insight and strength to vote against irresponsible development. Sangamon County Board members must provide strong leadership to protect their constituents by ensuring they aren’t negatively impacted by the economic development the board promotes.
It’s difficult to balance economic development and protecting constituents, but the benefits of tax revenues aren’t always what they seem to be. While North Mac School District, a recipient of the tax revenues from the CyrusOne project, serves students in Sangamon County, its offices and schools are in Macoupin County. Virden Fire Protection District, also a recipient, is also based in Macoupin County while a portion of its service area is in our county. In both cases, the money will not stay in the control of Sangamon County. The benefits to Sangamon County are negligible compared to the permanent negative impact to our communities.
The residents of Lowder and the landowners near the data center will carry the direct impact of noise, lights, impacts to quality of life and decreased property values. People who live in the Talkington Township area live there by choice, often because their families have lived there for generations. These people are the most vulnerable to the impact of this project. They have only one elected representative, one vote to protect them. They are at a disadvantage unless the majority of the County Board chooses these constituents over short-term revenues.
County Board members can make the choice to protect the community, deny this permit application and demand that the Springfield Sangamon Growth Alliance recruit responsible economic development that brings more jobs where the tax revenues remain in Sangamon County – projects that provide more benefit than harm, and projects that give more value per square foot than a data center. Sangamon County needs strong leaders who can make the difficult decision to put people over profit.
Lori McKiernan
Springfield
NO NOISE?
Cyrus One says they’ve “evolved” since their facility in Aurora was built in 2017, and now they’ve got noise under control. Too bad nobody fact-checked. Cyrus didn’t build the third phase of Aurora until 2024, and according to the folks up there, that’s the noisy one everyone is complaining about. If true, chalk up another lie from the Texas billionaire tech bros.
Don Hanrahan
Illinoistimes.com
This article appears in April 2-8, 2026.
