Ravenna Council Members Stress Careful Review of Data Center Rules
Ravenna City Council members are reviewing how the city should regulate data centers, including issues involving water use, electricity consumption and building size. Council members said the city’s existing moratorium prohibits expansion of an already-operating Bitcoin mining facility while new rules are studied.
Ravenna City Council members Tim Calfee and Carmen Laudato urged a careful review of proposed data center regulations, noting that the city code does not define a data center. They said any model language should be examined beyond a single committee meeting and could address water usage, electricity use and facility size.
Laudato said data centers can operate under names such as Bitcoin mining and disclosed that an existing Bitcoin mining operation in Ravenna reportedly has 500 servers, with plans to expand to about 4,000. She said the city’s moratorium bars expansion of an existing operation, while the council studies whether and how to adopt new regulations before the moratorium ends.