Georgia County Delays Vote on OpenAI's $20 Billion Data Centre Over Noise and Safety

The Board of Commissioners voted unanimously on Tuesday to delay the vote, according to Construction Review Online. District 2 Commissioner Roger Burdette, who made the motion, said the presentation from Octans GA LLC, the OpenAI affiliate developing the site, lacked clarity on noise protection and safety and conflicted with what OpenAI representatives had told him privately about earth berms to shield nearby homes. He said he would not stand behind the plan without approval for a 20-foot berm, and that he had no assurance on safety, which he called the top priority.

The delay matters beyond one county. Project Camellia is one of OpenAI's own Stargate campuses, valued by county leaders at $20 billion and described at its July launch as a 3.2 GW site, and it has become a test of whether large AI facilities can win local approval in a political climate that has turned against them. In this week's elections, voters chose to restrict data centres in 39 of 40 measures with complete counts, according to Redbud Consulting.

A Promise Made at Recess

Rich Modliszewski, who presented for Octans, initially could not confirm a berm and said noise mitigation would follow zoning requirements, according to the account of the meeting. After a phone call during a recess, he promised a 20-foot berm along Hodgeville Road, which borders dense residential neighbourhoods. The written plan did not contain that commitment. He also said on-site generators would serve "life safety and security systems" rather than the data centre buildings, and described the filing as a preliminary site plan, deferring most technical questions to engineers from Thomas & Hutton. Commissioners also raised water and sewer service, wetlands and generators.

District 4 Commissioner Beth Helmly said the board would discuss a moratorium on data centres at its next meeting.

The site plan, as described by WTOC before the meeting, covers about 1,347 acres across two parcels in the Savannah Gateway Industrial Hub near Rincon. It calls for six data centre buildings of about 42 feet each, a 100,000-square-foot warehouse, a 75,000-square-foot operations building, electrical substations, industrial chillers and 1,608 parking spaces. Reports differ on the number of substations: WTOC listed three, while Construction Review Online counted two. Early conceptual filings showed four data centre buildings.

County planning staff had recommended approval, concluding the application meets the standards for the county's industrial zoning. WTOC noted that parts of the site lie within freshwater wetlands and a FEMA flood zone. The vote had already been pushed back once, in mid-September, at the developer's request.

Residents Want More Than a Delay

Alexis Lane and Anna Lee HeidtHarris, co-founders of the residents' group Protect Effingham, welcomed the delay but said more time was needed. HeidtHarris argued that OpenAI was focused on meeting minimum requirements rather than honouring verbal commitments, and Lane pointed to the taller buildings in the revised plan. Resident Jerri Howell said a petition seeking a ban on data centres in all zoning districts had passed 1,500 signatures in about a month, and called the possible moratorium too little, too late.

The project also faces a lawsuit filed in September by a conservation group and five residents, who allege that local officials broke Georgia's open government laws in pushing the deal through, according to WTOC. The suit names the county's Industrial Development Authority and Octans GA.

When OpenAI announced the campus in July, it said it would pay the full cost of infrastructure and electric service, use closed-loop cooling that does not draw on the public water supply for cooling, and provide $80 million in community benefits, according to W.Media. Power is to be delivered in phases from 2028 to 2032 under a 25-year agreement with Georgia Power, with about 400 on-site jobs at opening rising to roughly 1,000. This week the company extended similar promises across its owned sites, pledging to pay for power and drop non-disclosure agreements with public officials.

The board is due to take up the site plan again on November 17.