A proposed data center at an old coal plant has splintered a small Finger Lakes community north of the liberal bastion of Ithaca.
TeraWulf proposed building a new data center to support artificial intelligence workloads on about 180 acres of a defunct coal plant on the shore of Cayuga Lake. The company has backing from Google for another upstate New York project and wants to bring the Cayuga data center online by 2026.
The project has raised concerns about noise and environmental impacts from some community members. Lansing officials are in the midst of a multiyear rezoning process and are now considering a yearlong moratorium on new developments.
The proposed moratorium has support from environmental groups opposed to data centers, but it has triggered strident pushback from TeraWulf executives. It also inspired a competitive — but ultimately unsuccessful — dual write-in campaign in Tuesday’s election for positions on the Lansing Town Board by local business owners John Duthie and Joe Lovejoy.
