BARKER – Plans for the next phase of construction of the Lake Mariner Data Center are one step closer to Somerset’s green light.
Last week, representatives from the data center’s parent company, Terawulf, appeared before the city planning agency to pitch the development of four new buildings to host an artificial intelligence data center on part of the former coal-fired power generating station.
Currently, the company has four buildings housing bitcoin mining facilities covering an area of 30 hectares. Work on a fifth building is expected to be completed next year.
“Obviously that area here has been sitting idle for years. So we looked at whether this would now be a great opportunity to use our artificial intelligence and build out there in an area that we can reuse,” said project manager John Mirabella.
The proposed development would cover approximately 23 hectares of the 400 hectare parcel the company owns.
“We would also have some switchgear buildings and some dry cooler yards consisting of chillers, dry coolers, you know, just setting up a glycol closed loop system to be able to cool these data servers,” Mirabella said.
The buildings would need another 20 megawatts of electricity to operate, he added.
Currently, the company has approval for an electricity allocation of 250 megawatts, 90% hydro from the New York Power Authority and the remainder from NYSEG, with the potential to increase to 500 megawatts, pending state approval.
When TeraWulf sought site approval from the city planning board in 2021, the proposal raised concerns among residents, including the prospect of noise from fans used to cool the buildings. The company has conducted two separate noise studies, but complaints are still coming in from some city residents.
The topic was a frequent topic of questioning among several board members and company staff during Thursday night’s meeting.
“I’ve lived in my house for 35 years. So I was there when the power plant was at full blast and it was at night, not as bothersome as it is now. I think part of the problem is that it’s stable now. is not peak and valley noise,” says board member Krista Atwater.
“We had a meter in the middle of the site. Then we had meters outside our site in several locations. We dropped the sound. The meter on our site dropped. The meters around the other locations did not move, so what kind of noise they also made what we picked up didn’t come from the site. We did this specifically so we could figure out what to fix if something needed to be fixed,” said project manager Jerry Goodenough.
According to Goodenough, the company is considering installing several blades on fans in an effort to reduce noise and noted that the city’s building inspector visits the site once a month to monitor construction.
Company representatives will also pitch their plans to the Niagara County Planning Board on Oct. 21.
On October 30, the city council will hold a public hearing on the local law to amend the planned unit development to allow for the development of the AI data center.
If the city council approves the change, the planning board can then approve the proposed site plan at their business meeting in November.
Lake Mariner Data currently has 22 employees, the majority of whom worked in the former coal-fired power plant. Goodenough estimates that this would increase to 35-40 employees with the construction of the AI data center.