By Allison Black Cornelius
A foreign-owned tech company wants to build a massive 79-acre AI Mega Factory in Oxmoor Valley that consumes as much electricity as 200,000 homes and requires enormous water resources in a county that has suffered drought conditions in 17 of the last 20 years.
They want to put it right in the middle of quiet family neighborhoods, houses of worship, parks, small businesses, nonprofits, schools, and a golf course, where it will generate industrial-scale noise, heat, light, and traffic around the clock. To power it, they would erect 125-foot transmission towers carrying 230,000-volt power lines through residential streets.
And they expect the citizens of Birmingham to help pay for it over the next 20 to 30 years.
Does that sound like a good deal to you?
Public hearing June 9th
On June 9th, the Birmingham City Council will hold a public hearing on a new proposed data center ordinance that will shape how future AI factories are approved throughout our city.
Most people think this debate is about technology.
It isn’t.
It is about whether Birmingham residents will still have a meaningful voice before projects of this type and scale are approved near their homes, schools, churches, hospitals, parks, and neighborhoods.
Back in April, Birmingham’s planning staff told the City Council they had studied data center regulations from across the country and incorporated lessons learned from communities already living alongside these facilities. Residents were told Birmingham was building its ordinance around those communities’ “gold standards”.
Then a new draft of the data center appeared last week.
Same cover. Different book.
To be fair, some things improved. The new draft requires additional disclosure regarding ultimate build-out, power infrastructure, and fuel-cell systems.
But one of the most important protections in the April draft disappeared.
The Planning Commission and Planning and Zoning (P&Z) staff recommended a Special Exception requirement for hyperscale AI factories, and the April draft presented to the public included that recommendation.
Why does that matter?
A Special Exception is when the public gets to ask questions before a project is approved.
- How much noise will the cooling systems generate twenty-four hours a day?
- How much waste heat will be discharged into the surrounding environment?
- What new substations, transmission lines, or electrical infrastructure will be required?
- How much water will be used?
- How will lighting affect nearby neighborhoods?
- What will the project look like from surrounding homes, schools, parks, and businesses?
- Will property owners bear impacts that were never anticipated when they invested in their homes or communities?
Those are not anti-technology questions.
They are common-sense questions.
And they are precisely the kinds of questions communities across America have spent years asking as hyperscale data centers have grown larger, louder, and more resource-intensive.
The current draft removes that project-specific hearing and instead classifies hyperscale AI factories as Permitted with Conditions.
That sounds harmless.
It isn’t.
In plain English, it means that a future hyperscale AI factory that meets the ordinance’s requirements can be approved administratively by city staff, without a project-specific public hearing before an independent board, or a vote, or an appeal to that vote.
The only notice required is a certified letter to property owners within 500 feet.
Yet the potential impacts of a hyperscale facility do not stop at 500 feet.
Noise does not stop at 500 feet.
Heat does not stop at 500 feet.
Electrical infrastructure does not stop at 500 feet.
Questions about water use, visual impacts, lighting, traffic, and property values do not stop at 500 feet.
So here is the question Birmingham residents should ask:
If the city truly studied the nation’s leading data center communities, where are the protections those communities have instituted?
The ordinance contains no setbacks from schools, hospitals, churches, parks, or animal shelters. No enforceable property-line noise limits. No independent verification of company studies. No ongoing monitoring requirements. No decommissioning bond. A bus stop gets more consideration in the setbacks than your home.
It also classifies facilities up to 30 megawatts and 200,000 square feet as “medium” data centers. Most people hear the word medium and picture something modest.
A 30-megawatt industrial facility is not modest.
Yet facilities of that size are subject to fewer requirements and provide neighbors with no notice at all.
Supporters of the ordinance argue that stronger protections could discourage investment.
The evidence suggests otherwise.
Loudoun County, Virginia, the largest data center market in the world, has moved toward more public review, not less. Other major data center communities continue to require additional hearings, studies, buffering requirements, and project-specific review while attracting billions of dollars in investment.
They did not choose between economic development and protecting residents.
They chose both.
The question is not whether Birmingham should welcome technology.
The question is whether Birmingham should adopt the same level of transparency, accountability, and community protection that many successful data center communities have already adopted.
If Birmingham’s ordinance is truly based on best practices, residents deserve to understand why so many of those protections are absent from the final draft, why the one project-specific review process recommended by the Planning Commission and Planning and Zoning staff was removed, and why facilities with industrial-scale power demand can still qualify for a significantly less protective review process.
The public hearing is June 9 at 9:00 a.m. in the Birmingham City Council Chambers.
Whether you support the ordinance, oppose it, or simply want to learn more, this is a conversation Birmingham should not have without the people of Birmingham in the room.
Please join ProtectOxmoor.org to learn more about data centers and how you can get involved.
Allison Black Cornelius is Chief Executive Officer of the Greater Birmingham Humane Society, one of the oldest and largest animal welfare organizations in the United States. A nationally recognized advocate and speaker, she has been honored by the White House and numerous national, civic, and nonprofit organizations over a career spanning more than three decades in public policy, child safety, nonprofit leadership, and animal welfare.
David Sher is the founder and publisher of ComebackTown. He’s past Chairman of the Birmingham Regional Chamber of Commerce (BBA), Operation New Birmingham (REV Birmingham), and the City Action Partnership (CAP).
If you care about Birmingham’s future, subscribe to ComebackTown newsletter
Invite David to speak for free to your group about how we can have a more prosperous metro Birmingham. dsher@comebacktown.com
I thought this was dead? A data center belongs on the outskirts of town in sparsely populated areas, like Adger or West Birmingham, certainly not in Oxmoor Valley and definitely not next to the future home of the GBHS. But in reality, no data centers at all, ever.
There is nothing beneficial about having a data center; they increase electric bills for everyone in Jefferson County, they have a constant hum and emit frequencies harmful to animals, they consume HUGE amounts of water (some greater than the entire municipality of Birmingham), and what is the long-term benefit? Nothing. Temporary employment at best, and most don’t employ local firms; they have contracted firms outside of Birmingham. There is no economic benefit to having a data center, and, worst of all, property values within a 10-mile radius of the facility will decline. In addition, all the end results will be more control over our lives, the ability to shut off vehicles, freeze bank accounts, basically lose all your freedoms, and these centers require location for control, storage of your data for monthly subscription fees for everything on your computer, which now becomes property of the government.
NO DATA CENTERS!
For a city hall and a city council that has adopted the motto “putting people first“ this is outrageous. The residents of Oxmoor Valley deserve better. Is it any wonder why the City of Birmingham continues to lose population? For the City of Birmingham to have encouraged residential development in the Oxmoor Valley, but then to allow the presence of a mega data center in what is essentially now a residential area is wrong on so many levels. There is no excuse for doing this. Our Mayor and Council should be ashamed of themselves.
And, by the way, this is a brilliant explanation by Allison Black Cornelius. Thank you for making all of us aware of what is going on in our city.
Thank you
Absolutely agree!
Birmingham is my hometown and Edgewood is my home neighborhood. Oxmoor Road is in my blood. But this fight is for all the people of Birmingham and surrounding areas. From the Midwest, I’ll be with you in spirit.
The mayor I read about in the last issue of Comebacktown — if he is what he seems — should be with the people on this.
This has Nothing to do with the loss of population in this city over the last SIX Decades and it is disingenuous for you to suggest that data centers, a relatively new technology over the past 5-10 years, has anything to do with this trend.
How the City of Birmingham is handling Mebius and the draft ordinance is exactly why people have left and Tuesday June 9th will be a signal moment.
You’re the first person I’ve seen putting this hypocrisy to the forefront. When I enter the elevator at city hall and see putting people first I want to be sick.
There is a lot of misinformation in this post. Hyperbolic fear mongering certainly does not serve the argument. The fact is that this is a brand new technology that without doubt will change the world. It absolutely will happen and the question for Birmingham should be where to position ourselves in this revolution that is happening before our eyes. Too much unfettered enthusiasm and we risk potentially horrifying consequences for our water and power grid and quality of life. But too much caution risks being left behind, once again, in a multi billion dollar economic bounty. The fact is that we Do Not Know what the long term consequences of data centers is. And anyone saying definitively that they know is lying. Another fact: the Atlanta metro has over 80 data centers right now today. Bham metro? You can count them on one hand. Yet Atlanta has not suffered any catastrophes in terms of their power grid or water supply. Without adequate information yet, it is government official’s responsibility to manage this effectively, public safety AND economic growth and development. It should NOT be entirely up to a public ruled by fear mongering and disinformation and NIMBYs to decide the fate of this city. Because, if left up to the public, most would be totally fine with this city remaining Stuck not only in this static, near Zero growth Present, but to even return to the past, while the rest of the country moves aggressively into the AI future.
Then let’s debate. Go point by point JR and tell me what the misinformation is because I spent quite a bit of hours making sure it was not misinformation. Let’s talk about Georgia. Virginia. Illinois. Etc. I have the facts and am ready to go. So start listing the misinformation. You can’t.
Period.
Sure. Well, for one, the city of Birmingham is not offering Any incentives for this project. The taxpayers of this city are not spending one dime to attract this development or on the required infrastructure. So there is NO evidence that this will cost Birmingham taxpayers for decades, as you stated. Furthermore, the other effects are mixed. Nebius says it will use a closed water system that continually recycles its water so this should have minimal effects on our water supply. Finally, this is a very large center so the power demands will be huge, but Alabama Power officially says that this can be handled and Nebius is building its own substation. Is Alabama Power lying? Who knows? But neither you nor I have evidence that they are, so there is that. What we do know is that Nebius says this will generate $44 million per year for Birmingham City Schools. Are they lying? Maybe, but we don’t have evidence of that either. But this is a poor district with many poor students so, despite the few jobs that will be created, that money could be significant for our school system.
“Do we know the full effects? No, but let’s do it anyway and see what happens. We might get some tax dollars out of it!”
Is this all of what I need to address? I want to make sure before I do it the entirety of your response. Because respectfully this will be simple. So if there is anything else please add it now so that I can do it in one reply.
Correct there is misinformation in the article. First the proposed location is not in any neighborhood as the article title aserts but rather an office park. The location is the former Regions Operations Center. Secondly there is already a data center currently in operation just over a mile down Lakeshore in the Jefferson Metropolitian Industrial Complex, which is associated with BCBS of AL. Not to mention that Cyberdyne has almost completed another $180 million dollar data center in the same industrial park.
I haven’t seen or heard anyone complaining about either of these other 2 data centers, but now a new proposed data center is a probelm? I’m willing to bet outrage about data centers is one of two things: the “not in my yard!” attitude or somebody becoming “educated” via tiktok or some other social media (Karen syndrom).
Sorry, I just don’t buy it. It appears to me to be fake outrage at best by people folks who are just looking for the next thing to be angry about.
So you think 1100 feet from 100 homes, 1210 feet from a daycare for special needs children, 1900 feet from a golf course, 2120 feet from an elementary school and about 2000 feet from a subdivision 500 homes is not residential. Then I have an idea – Mtn Brook has an office park right by 280 and English Village. You know the one? By the exit that goes left to Homewood and right to Bromberg’s. How about Let’s put Nebius right there. No problem.
The office park is not zoned residential. Neither is the industrial park just over a mile away that has a data center operating for the last 5+ years and another that will be operating by end of the year.
The data center isn’t going into Ross Bridge, which is less than a mile and a half away. Rather the data center is planned to be built in an area for which it is zoned.
I have zero problem putting any business in a location for which it is zoned. Just as I have zero problem with residential houses being built in areas for which they are zoned.
As for the suggestion to locate a data center in the office park between 280 and English Village….if the zoning is adequate then go for it. I lived in English Village for several years and I would have zero problem with a company building. I’m not a “Stay out of my neighborhood” kind of guy.
I drive the length of Lakeshore weekly, from the “Tiniest Kingdom” through to Parkwood. I work with quite a few of the buisness leaders on the western end of Lakeshore. Those business leaders actually like the idea of another data center in the area. I don’t exactly know their reasons, but something tells me it has to do with the future of their own businesses. Don’t get me wrong I can understand why someone might not like the idea of a business coming into an area near their home/school/business, but not everyone has the same opinion.
Isn’t it crystal clear why over the mountain cities want little to do with the city of Birmingham and how it is managed?
Which community anywhere wants this unknown entity in their back yard?
Take it to rural areas. I would like to follow the money trail here to see where it leads to.
If the long term results of living with this is unknown, why risk it?
Forget Atlanta- Birmingham does not want to be another Atlanta. I’ve lived both places and Atlanta is much overrated. Bigger is not better. Smaller is better sometimes.
We don’t know enough about this project to approve it.
With all due respect, you Alabamians and those of Birmingham can calm down. On your best day you will never be Atlanta…nor Nashville, nor Charlotte, nor Raleigh. That ship has sailed. You can stop bringing it up as if it is even an option for you in 2026.
I can’t remember the name of the company building that was recently torn down on the proposed site. I do know it was a generic office building that didn’t last 20 years. I actualy question if this is city of Birmingham or unincorporated. Yes, to the immediate north is Wenonah, with Ross Bridge to the south, and WeHo to the east. That leaves a large swath of unincorporated area west of the Publix supermarket. I travel the length of lakeshore weekly and the building taking place west of Oxmoor Road is definetly picking up, especially apartments. I’m a little surprised by the location, as it seems to be a better fit another couple miles west, maybe just opposite of the new JeffCo Coroners Office. Another option might be near the 35th Ave Superfund site, which is kinda between ABC Coke (Tarrant) and the I-22/65 exchange. Just a thought.
See what i wrote above. It is smack dab in the middle of houses, apartments, churches, a golf course, a wedding venue, a daycare dormsoecial needs children, Oxmoor school and The Redding a proposed 500 new home subdivision all within 1100 to 2000 feet.
Is the proposed data center near the GBHS? If so, I can understand the potential threat to the animals there—in addition to all the other pitfalls Ms. Cornelius has eloquently outlined. For anyone in metro Birmingham concerned about the welfare of dogs and cats, imagine this scenario: A data center has been proposed to be constructed immediately next to the Nashville Zoo at Grassmere, with all its rare and endangered species. The groundswell of opposition has already likely nixed that idea.
I find it odd that I was not able to post a reply earlier (I would have been the first), but now that there are several replies and now the “comment” box magically appears.
Anyway, misinformation or not (who cares about the irrelevant details), they’re building a data center in the Birmingham area nonetheless. This is a nationwide concern, as I currently reside in Ohio, which is a major battleground for these data centers right now. They are overwhelmingly unpopular by over 75% of the population, and they’re not wanted, but government and industries and the military (they will benefit the most from it) all want it, and their prerogative trumps whatever the average person may want. You cannot have a 24/7 surveillance grid (managed by “AI”) if you do not have a data center in every town in America above a certain size. The impact on the utility bills and resource allocation is only the immediate and pressing concern, but I’m looking at the long-term impact as well, and it is definitely not good.
“It will bring jobs.” Myth. The jobs they’re bringing are contractor and subcontractor positions needed to construct the physical facility and provide the infrastructure (electrical, plumbing, HVAC, lighting, etc.), and as soon as the facility is complete, those jobs are gone, as the facility will virtually run itself with a skeleton crew of IT and maintenance, many working remotely (roughly 25 – 40 people, depending on size). The number of people employed there (many of whom, both the contractors building it and the IT professionals running it, are not local labor) do not match the capital investment of the entire endeavor.