Courtesy Meta
An undated photo of the Meta Data Center in Eagle Mountain.
Eagle Mountain has emerged as a hub for technology centers since Meta built its data center there and expanded the site in 2022. In addition to Meta, Google has acquired land there and QTS announced it will enter the Salt Lake market at Eagle Mountain.
Eagle Mountain's future has several data centers in store. Tract, a developer of master-planned data center parks, is paving the way by preparing the ground for these developments. On Jan. 18, Tract announced the acquisition of 668 acres of land in two areas of the city, one southeast of Meta and the other east of the Tyson facility.
Evan Perrett, Eagle Mountain's director of economic development, said Tract will develop all the infrastructure needed to build the data centers, but is not completing the actual construction of the buildings. “They will prepare these sites to eventually resell or lease them to other data center developers to come in and build the structures themselves,” he said. While development agreements are still being prepared, it is expected that the data centers will only be developed on land.
“Beyond the financial impact, our new technology neighbors have been great additions to our community, and we look forward to working with partners like Tract to develop new campuses and expand our exposure as a technology hub while maintaining our small-town charm,” Eagle Mountain Mayor Tom Westmoreland said in a press release.
Some of the preparations that Tract will complete include water conservation systems, electrical infrastructure, access to existing fiber internet infrastructure, road access and other necessities for the data centers that will be built there. “One of the most important things about this is that these sites are not ready for any type of water cooling, and that will mostly be supported by the necessary air cooling or electrical cooling infrastructure,” Perret said.
“We appreciate Tract’s leadership in reducing the impact on water, as well as its innovative approaches to operating its campus,” Scott Cuthbertson, president and CEO of the Utah Economic Development Corporation, said in the press release. “Expansion of this resource-conscious data center can help ensure Utah’s economic prosperity, today and into the future.”
The press release notes that the land acquired by Tract “is located within the Regional Technology Innovation (RTI) overlay, which allows for the direct use of data centers, manufacturing sites and advanced R&D, supported by expedited administrative review processes for site plans and to enable speed and certainty for initial site development.” Tract is working with Rocky Mountain Power to deliver more than 400 megawatts of new transmission infrastructure by 2028.
Tyler Muffett, Eagle Mountain's director of communications, said officials have worked hard over the past years to make the city attractive to these data centers. “The tract aligns with something Eagle Mountain has really focused on, which is data centers,” he said. “This will not only attract, but also promise, billions of dollars in investment at Eagle Mountain and in Utah County.”
These data centers have brought and will bring money into Eagle Mountain's economy, increasing its population and providing skilled jobs for residents, Berrett added.
Tract bought the land from private developers, and the city was involved in prior preparation to make Eagle Mountain an attractive place for data centers, Perrett said. A recurring compliment to Eagle Mountain coming from Tract has been the creation of our Regional Technology and Industry Overlay District. This overlay zone makes the approval process with the city easier for data centers as long as they meet certain conditions such as having a certain investment level or providing a certain number of jobs, Perrett explained.
“We identified data centers early on as a way to employ residents, pay for infrastructure for our growing city, and form partnerships to strengthen this close-knit community,” Westmoreland stated in the press release.
According to Beret, it is not yet known how many jobs will be created through the data centers being developed on the lands being prepared. But compared to the jobs created by other data centers, they expect the number to be in the hundreds. The data centers themselves will reportedly provide long-term, high-paying jobs, but throughout their construction, temporary construction jobs will also be available. Not only will they need to construct the building in terms of frames and cement, but high-tech buildings also require highly experienced people from a variety of fields including engineers, architects, geo-information analysts and others.
the news
