Sitka planners recommend outright ban on data centers in every zone

Sitka's Planning Commission voted 4-0 on Oct. 21 to recommend banning data centers in every zone of the city and borough, rejecting a city staff plan that would have let them in through a conditional use permit in five districts, according to city meeting records cited in Sitka reporting and confirmed by Alaska public radio station KCAW.

Nothing is banned yet. The recommendation now goes to the Sitka Assembly, which can accept it, change it or reject it outright. It was not on the Assembly's Oct. 27 agenda, meaning Sitka residents will not see a final decision this month.

For a city of 8,032 people running almost entirely on hydropower, the question is about more than zoning. Sitka's electric grid is islanded, it is not connected to any larger regional grid, and city staff have warned that a single large data center could strain both power supply and the fresh water used to cool server equipment. According to the staff memo behind the proposal, one megawatt of electricity demand, the kind a modest data center could draw, is enough to support 100 to 300 high-demand homes. In a city where the median household earns $101,727 a year, per the state's Community Database Online, a sudden jump in demand on a fixed hydro system could ripple into electric rates for everyone else on the grid.

At an Oct. 21 public hearing, Sitka commissioners said they didn't trust a conditional use permit process to protect the city from an industry still new to Southeast Alaska. Commissioner Wendy Alderson said that permitting data centers as a conditional use in any zone could tie the commission's hands into approving a facility that technically meets existing permit standards.