Lyon County's board of commissioners recently advanced a request for the construction of the Monarch Data Center on 500 acres of farmland just outside the county seat of Yerington. This decision has intensified a statewide debate over whether data centers belong on land historically dedicated to agricultural production, with rural Nevadans largely opposing such developments. Residents have consistently attended public meetings to voice their disapproval, including David Janakos, who stated in August that Yerington had been lined up for a project its residents never requested.
The broader discussion surrounding data center locations has grown across Nevada over the last year, with people statewide generally uniting against their construction in neighborhoods and urban areas. While Nevada's data centers have, until recently, mostly been situated in industrial parks, research compiled by the Pew Research Center indicates a national shift. More than two-thirds of approximately 1,500 data centers planned nationwide are slated for rural areas, and nearly 40 percent are in counties that currently have no such facilities.
For counties experiencing financial challenges, this shift can mean new revenue streams. Lyon County Manager Andrew Haskin highlighted that the tax revenue an industrial property brings in is “significant.” This contrasts with the revenue from farmlands, which primarily comes from property taxes, a source limited by state caps on year-over-year growth. Such limits can stifle the coffers of historically agriculture-driven counties like Lyon. While Yerington remains an agricultural hub and home to a leading onion producer, the county's largest city, Fernley, sees many residents commute to industrial work at the nearby Tahoe-Reno Industrial Center in adjacent Storey County.
Lyon County, which ranks last in the state for revenue per capita compared to industry-heavy Storey and mining-heavy Eureka counties, is now slated to have eight data centers built within its borders over the next several years. This development is partly driven by other significant infrastructure projects, including the massive Greenlink transmission line being built through Lyon County and an NV Energy substation poised to be one of the largest in the world. The broader Northern Nevada region is considered one of the top global locations for data center construction. Fred Steinmann, director of UNR's Center for Economic Development, noted this as the “latest iteration” of an ongoing tension between agriculture, industry, and residents.
As Lyon County's population has surged to become the third-largest in the state, new residents require increased resources such as maintained roads and law enforcement. Steinmann explained the necessity of industry to generate revenues, stating, “Growth does not pay for itself,” if residents are unwilling to cover 100 percent of the costs. Patrick Donnelly, Great Basin director for the Center for Biological Diversity, suggested that data center developers target rural communities because these “small rural communities that are heavily influenced by relatively modest amounts of money.” Steinmann added that the same amount of money “moves the needle in rural communities” much further than in urban areas.
Data center developers typically seek reasonably priced land with access to the power grid, transportation infrastructure, and an available workforce. Lyon County meets many of these criteria due to its strategic positioning near the Tahoe-Reno Industrial Center and access to major east-west routes like Interstate 80 and Highway 50, as well as the north-south Highway 95. Tract, a developer of data center campuses that acquired over 1,000 acres in Lyon County, described Northern Nevada as a “compelling growth alternative to the Bay Area,” with market growth expanding outward from the Tahoe Reno Industrial Center. Lyon County has historically faced economic challenges, struggling to recover from the 2008 recession, ranking nationally as the third most economically depressed county of its size in 2011, with the highest unemployment and foreclosure rates in the state that year. Lyon County Manager Haskin was quoted in a press release stating that the county “works hard to create a business-friendly environment.”
Despite the economic motivations, public opposition to the Monarch Data Center included significant concerns over water and power usage. NV Energy has already acknowledged that it does not have enough power lined up to support the influx of data centers coming to Nevada. Furthermore, a 2024 UC Berkeley report drafted for Congress estimated that data centers used 17.43 billion gallons of water in 2023, a number projected to double by 2028. However, data center proponents argue this amount is substantially less than the water consumed by agriculture; the U.S. Department of Agriculture reported that American agricultural producers consumed 81 million acre-feet of water in 2023.
The 500 acres in Mason Valley slated for the Monarch Data Center are strategically located near the ongoing construction of NV Energy's massive Walker River Substation, part of its Greenlink high-voltage transmission line project. Nearby plans also include a sprawling series of utility-scale solar projects, such as Winston Energy, a 400-megawatt solar and 400-megawatt battery storage project. Michael Paul, permitting manager at Copia Power, the company seeking to develop the land, referred to the area as an “energy hub,” underscoring its appeal for industrial energy consumers.
