There's a lot of talk about the proposed data center, it's environmental and water impact but very little details presented from MIDA around specifics.
One thing I want to bring attention to is: who are the primary drivers of this project? It's not Kevin O'Leary. It's a real estate investment group out of Alta Utah called West GenCo.
This is a group of people that specialize in flipping land. They acquire rural land and re-zone it.
I suspect their true specialty is convincing government officials to sponsor and approve their projects, much like we're seeing with MIDA, Governor Cox and everyone upstream of the City Counsel.
Austin Pritchett spoke at the last City Counsel meeting and made the technical arguments for the MIDA representative. Do not be fooled, he is not a subject matter expert on data centers, water, or power.
He's a salesman. His expertise is finance, insurance, real estate, and private equity.
He is a real estate investor that stands to make insane amounts of money that will consume our resources while the profit is siphoned off to everywhere but Box Elder County while also ensuring a 71 year old billionaire gets insane tax cuts for the next 10 years. Both Pritchett and O'Leary are perfectly happy to rob all of us of breathable air, our health and our water to make a little more money.
What meager taxes are collected won't even begin to cover the repair and loss as a result of the data center project. It's a land and water grab from far wealthier people that want to exploit rural Utah.
In Jody Machpherson's interview with Pritchett, he refused to answer any technical questions regarding emissions, air quality or even types of power used on the site. In the last city counsel meeting he briefly mentioned burning diesel in addition to natural gas.
In the substack article, Pritchett stated that speed of the project is the reason it will succeed. Not it's efficacy.
As we heard at the city counsel meeting on repeat, "The best technology will be used", however no one can speak to this amazing technology. It's a lie. They will do what is happening at every other data center site in the nation. The 'best' technology is what is cheapest for them regardless on it's impact for us.
Everything about this project is predicated on bad business practices from low moral, exceptionally wealthy people who get to head south to their rich neighborhoods while we choke on the emissions. They say water isn't an issue only because they can buy it all. That's an issue for us.
The next meeting is in Tremonton at the Box Elder County Fairgrounds at 4pm. Austin Pritchett will not stop, but hopefully we can keep him out of Box Elder. Please attend if you are able.