In regards to the issue of the former Hynix site being potentially used for a data center, I think letter-writer Jean Cottel makes a good point that city code ought to take into account water and power use for industrial land use. That said, I believe that the zoning requirements already laid out in the E-1 Campus Employment zone definition would prohibit using the site for a “hyperscaler” data center.

A 2024 study by the state of Virginia put the number of long-term employees of a data center at 50 per 250,000 square feet. Assuming that all 1.2 million square feet of the facility would be utilized, post-construction, the site would have approximately nine employees per acre, which I doubt meets the E-1 zone criteria, which states:

“In general, this zone is designed for firms that will help achieve economic diversification objectives and that typically have a large number of employees per acre.”

An article from the Environment and Energy Study Institute highlights that the cooling systems required by a data center can produce 96 decibels of noise within the facility, which can leak into nearby surroundings. Additionally, in order to weather power outages, data centers tend to be outfitted with backup diesel generators, which can generate up to 105 decibels during monthly tests or operation.

In a study of heat effects of data centers’ temperature data from NASA’s MODIS LST dataset, researchers found a heat island effect associated with the data centers, with an average temperature rise of 3.75 degrees Fahrenheit at the data center itself, and an average increase of 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit at a distance of 2.8 miles.

These noise and heat externalities don’t seem in keeping with the E-1 zone criteria:

“The activities of such firms do not generate offensive external impacts and usually do not tolerate substantial noise, pollution, or vibration from surrounding uses.”

Finally, it’s plausible that the demands on Eugene’s power grid from a hyperscale data center could be argued to be an “offensive external impact” under the zoning.

Wyn Manselle
Eugene