Two counties in Pennsylvania have the right idea about managing transparency and accountability for large scale data centers. I would only recommend a few enhancements for Upstate South Carolina and Spartanburg County. 

The original county source is the April 2026 Data Center Ordinance Guide, Version 1.0, prepared jointly by the Chester County Planning Commission and Montgomery County Planning Commission. The guide is available from Chester County’s official data center page and Montgomery County’s official guide page, with the PDF also mirrored through PA DEP.  

The guide is not a ban on data centers. It is a municipal zoning and conditional-use framework for large-scale data centers, especially facilities over 100,000 square feet, including hyperscale projects that may range from 50 megawatts to 1 gigawatt of demand.  

Its strongest recommendation is that municipalities treat large data centers as a conditional use, requiring simultaneous conditional-use and preliminary land-development review so elected officials see the full technical record before approval.  

The guide addresses the major local impacts: zoning districts, setbacks, aesthetics, energy usage, co-located power generation, backup generators, water use, wastewater, thermal impacts, noise, vibration, emergency response, e-waste, parking, decommissioning, public engagement, and possible community benefits agreements.  

It recommends separating ordinary backup generation from normal-operation power generation. If a data center builds its own power plant, the guide says that should be regulated as a separate principal use, not hidden inside the data center approval.  

Technically, that is one of the guide’s most important points. A data center building and a power generation facility have different risks: one is an industrial computing facility; the other may involve gas turbines, substations, emissions, fuel supply, transmission interconnection, noise, and emergency-response risks.

The guide also recommends an Energy Usage Plan prepared and certified by a professional engineer. It should identify annual electricity demand, energy supply, storage, backup power, renewable or clean-energy efforts, grid interconnection status, and reporting commitments.  

The guide’s backup-power section is practical. It recognizes diesel generators as a major source of noise and emissions, recommends Tier 4 EPA standards, annual testing reports, limits fossil-fuel backup generation to emergencies and short maintenance tests, and prohibits peak shaving or supplying power to the grid from emergency generators.  

Its water section is also useful. It recommends avoiding private groundwater or surface withdrawals for cooling when public water is available, requiring closed-loop or more efficient cooling, requiring public-water capacity documentation, and requiring water feasibility studies for nonpublic sources.  

The thermal-impact section is unusually advanced for a county ordinance guide. It requires evaluation of waste-heat sources, heat plumes, localized heat islands, seasonal conditions, mitigation design, possible waste-heat reuse, and monitoring where needed.  

The noise section is one of the strongest parts. It recognizes that A-weighted decibels alone may miss low-frequency noise, recommends C-weighted analysis, pre-construction and post-construction studies, octave-band analysis, full-spectrum modeling, and property-line limits of 40 dB(A)/50 dB(C) at night and 45 dB(A)/60 dB(C) during the day.  

The emergency-services section properly treats data centers as special industrial facilities, not simple warehouses. It requires emergency response planning, review by fire and emergency services, training paid for by the applicant, annual inspections, radio coverage, battery-storage compliance with NFPA 855, and procedures for fire suppression, containment, ventilation, and evacuation.  

The public-engagement section is important because mistrust often comes from secrecy. The guide recommends a public meeting before the first planning commission meeting and a public project website with maps, renderings, construction timelines, phasing, meeting dates, and permit status.  

The community benefits section is legally careful. It says community benefits agreements should not be codified as ordinance requirements, municipalities cannot compel them without risking an unlawful exaction, and any benefits should have nexus and proportionality to actual impacts.  

Evaluation

The Chester-Montgomery guide is one of the better practical local-government documents now available because it does not simply say yes or no to data centers. It gives municipalities a structured way to ask the right technical questions before approving a project.

Its strengths are: conditional-use review, clear definition of data centers and campuses, recognition of accessory uses, separation of co-located generation as a separate use, professional engineering review, quantified noise standards, water and wastewater feasibility review, emergency planning, e-waste planning, decommissioning, and public transparency.

Its main weakness is that it is still a zoning guide, not a full utility, energy-market, tax, ratepayer-protection, or infrastructure-financing framework. It acknowledges that some issues are better handled by state, federal, utility, or regional energy-market authorities.  

What is missing or should be added: mandatory utility cost-allocation disclosure; proof that residential and small-business ratepayers will not subsidize new transmission or generation costs; enforceable construction-phase noise and traffic controls; long-term operating monitoring after final approval; cybersecurity and physical-security coordination; battery hazard modeling; greenhouse-gas and air-emissions reporting for on-site generation; firm water drought-condition operating limits; and independent third-party technical review funded by the applicant.