Prince William Chamber Panel Discussion Highlights Contributions of Data Center Industry
February 16, 2023 – Allison M. Gilmore, CAE, Data Center Coalition
On Wednesday, February 15, 2023, three Data Center Coalition members from the Northern Virginia area spoke at a panel as part of the Prince William Chamber of Commerce’s Economic Development Breakfast Series. The panel “The Business of Data Centers: Impacts and Opportunities in Prince William County,” included panelists Sarah Georgiades, Regional Community Engagement Manager, AWS, Kevin Hughes, Vice President, Policy, STACK Infrastructure, and Rohit Kinra, VP & Global Head of Hyperscale Implementation & Account Management, Iron Mountain. During the discussion, which was moderated by Data Center Coalition President Josh Levi, the panelists shared insights on the data center market in Prince William County as well as the industry's community contributions, workforce efforts, and commitment to sustainability.
Levi kicked off the conversation by asking panelists what makes a data center a data center. Kinra explained that data centers are the physical embodiment of the cloud and that all the data we use and transmit on a daily basis gets processed and stored in data centers. Hughes elaborated with examples of the different types of data centers, including those that house the computer servers of multiple independent tenants who lease only the space they need (multitenant) and others that serve one, often large customer (hyperscale).
Panelists also discussed some of the reasons for the substantial growth of the data center industry in Prince William County, including availability of land, the ecosystem of suppliers, talented workforce, and proximity to fiber cables that run through Ashburn all the way to subsea cables that cross the Atlantic Ocean. The industry’s growth in the County has led to significant local tax revenues. In 2021 alone, the data center industry contributed more than $79 million in taxes to Prince William County, an increase of 24% from the previous year. These funds were enough to pay the county’s full community development budget, including economic development, libraries, parks and recreation, planning & zoning, public works, and transportation.
Kinra explained that while data centers contribute sizable tax revenue, they use relatively few county services. For example, in Prince William County, for every $1.00 in county services used by data centers, they provided approximately $13.50 in tax revenue. Hughes highlighted that data centers also provide long-term construction jobs and have a ripple effect through an ecosystem of vendors and service providers, where each data center job supports 3.4 other jobs in the County.
Data centers also provide tremendous support to the communities where their teams live and work. Georgiades of Amazon shared examples of her company’s community engagement partnerships and initiatives in the County, including programs supporting Prince William County Public Schools. She explained the importance of STEM education and training a technology-savvy workforce.
The panel concluded with a discussion of how the data center industry promotes energy efficiency and sustainability. They explained that data centers already offer more efficient processing than computing that was traditionally dispersed across businesses operating their own independent, on-site servers. By centralizing computing resources under one roof, data centers leverage innovations in design, equipment, and technology to maximize energy efficiency. Georgiades, Hughes, and Kinra all highlighted their companies’ commitments to sustainability, including establishing and pursuing aggressive carbon neutrality goals including powering their operations with 100 percent clean energy. Georgiades indicated that AWS, now the largest purchaser of clean energy globally, will reach its goal of powering their operations with 100% renewable energy by 2025—five years ahead of their original 2030 target.
