Roane County Commissions Amends Data Moratorium Plan
The Roane County Commission approved a resolution to enact a two-year moratorium on all new data center developments. The resolution tasks the county planning commission with developing new regulations for future sites. Concerns were also raised regarding the fire risk associated with data centers.
The Roane County Commission has moved to implement a two-year moratorium on all new data center construction within the county. This decision follows a resolution requesting the county planning commission to issue the pause and subsequently develop comprehensive new regulations for any future data center sites.
The initial proposal was for a six-month moratorium, which commissioners amended to a two-year period during their meeting. A new concern was also voiced by one commissioner regarding the significant fire risk posed by data centers and utility places during emergency events, noting their difficulty to manage. Research from Texas A&M supports this concern, with a study highlighting higher risks for fire prevention in energy and tech infrastructure due to battery failures, electrical faults like arc flashes, equipment malfunction, and human error, all contributing to fires that are notoriously hard to extinguish.