Everybody wants the modern economy, right up until the modern economy needs a place to plug in. The Greeley Tribune reports a New York-based company, Global AI, bought 438 acres at the former Carestream Health site in Windsor to develop an AI-powered data center, while the Colorado House considers House Bill 1030 to juice data centers with a 20-year state sales tax exemption.
It is early days on the project. Demolition permits are underway, a formal site plan is not, and the company says it could have a portion operational by the end of this year.
The Bullet Point Brief
- Global AI purchased 438 acres at the former Carestream Health site at 2000 Howard Smith Avenue W, between Windsor and Greeley, for $15.6M.
- House Bill 1030 would create a data center development program, establish a Colorado Data Center Development Authority, and offer a full state sales tax exemption for 20 years.
- To qualify, operators must commit at least $250 million in investments within five years, hire full-time employees within two years, and meet water stewardship and energy efficiency requirements.
- County staff say water will be analyzed through the site plan and permitting process, and that water limitations will not be an issue.
- Job estimates cited include about 1,500 construction jobs and 100 permanent jobs per facility, with a current estimate of around 40 to 60 for this site and possibly up to 100 later.
My Bottom Line
It’s interesting how controversial data centers have become, and I’m not blind to why. When our aging electric grid is showing its vulnerabilities, the last thing folks want is a new neighbor that swills power like the Rat Pack did bourbon.
And let’s not pretend the Denver playbook helps. The democrats in the state legislature, complete with renewable mandates, love to talk about reliability right up until reliability needs natural gas, transmission, and adult math.
If you want AI, cloud, streaming, and all the shiny “digital services,” you better be serious about generation, delivery, and permitting, not just feelings and slogans.
I get it. People see “data center,” and they don’t picture jobs; they picture higher demand, bigger substations, and the usual political shell game where locals get the impacts, and someone else gets the press conference. If it’s so “clean and reliable,” it shouldn’t need a 20-year tax break to survive.
So yes, pursue the opportunity, but do it the Weld way: prove the water plan in the permit, prove the power plan with the utilities, prove the job numbers once shovels hit dirt, and don’t let the Capitol City crowd mandate us into a reliability ditch and then act surprised when the lights flicker. If the project pencils, great. If it doesn’t, we don’t owe anyone a subsidy and a prayer.
Source: The Greeley Tribune
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