WVDEP confirms Fundamental Data had legal site control for proposed Ridgeline Facility in Tucker County

The West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection (WVDEP) has officially confirmed that Fundamental Data LLC met the site-control requirements for its planned Ridgeline Facility in Tucker County. This decision resolves a regulatory inquiry initiated by the WVDEP's Division of Air Quality (DAQ) last month.

According to Casey L. Chapman of Fundamental Data LLC, the company's submission of a redacted purchase and sale agreement from July 19, 2024, between Fundamental Data as purchaser and Western Pocahontas Properties Limited Partnership as seller, was sufficient. The WVDEP conducted a geographical and legal review, confirming the 291-acre tract identified in the agreement aligns precisely with the facility's location map and plot plans provided in the air quality permit application. The agency accepted the redacted agreement, stating that commercial pricing and transactional terms were confidential and not essential for site control verification.

This resolution allows Fundamental Data to proceed with the Ridgeline Facility's regulatory process. However, the determination does not address an ongoing dispute with state officials over whether the project must undergo certification as a "High Impact Data Center" under West Virginia law. State officials contend the project's proposed scale, potentially involving multiple gigawatts of power generation and data center capacity, exceeds the 90-megawatt critical IT load threshold. Fundamental Data disputes this interpretation, maintaining the project's ultimate configuration remains conceptual, with initial plans for approximately 800 megawatts of natural gas-fired generation and 1.3 gigawatts of solar power for its first phase.