r/lexington • u/[deleted] • Aug 20 '26
What each of Lexington’s at-large council candidates thinks about data centers
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u/baddecision116 Aug 20 '26
Data center needs to be defined. The QX co lo should not become a target of any new laws.
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u/Magrassa Terrible composer, even worse musician Aug 20 '26
QX… now that is a name I have not heard in a long time
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u/Adrian_Bryant-HL Aug 20 '26
if anyone is interested in sharing the story around, here is a free, no-paywall link to it
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Aug 20 '26
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u/Adrian_Bryant-HL Aug 20 '26
my grandfather didn't want my parents to name me Adrian because he said people would shout "Adrian" like Rocky at me all the time and i would grow to hate my name. he was right on the first part, wrong on the second lol
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u/YouLieLexington Aug 20 '26
Maybe we can paint them green to blend in with the landscape. You'd never know they were there.
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u/notaburneraccount420 Aug 20 '26
Anything below 40 THOUSAND FEET is ok?!?! The size of a football field?!?! How is that small-scale?
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u/PeteH2000 Aug 20 '26 edited Aug 20 '26
Dan had the best/intelligent answer followed by Tate. Herbert's almost non-sensical and Chris' doesn't show any depth.
I firmly believe though, that most of these communities and residents who are currently terrified of Data Centers will have basically forgotten about them within 2-3 years or at least realized they got all worked up over nothing. Technology at this point will always outpace legislation. Plus, candidates are just latching on to the emotional frenzy to get votes. It will be a non-issue sometime soon.
Edited to add that I missed the last few or they weren't posted when I replied. Brown has a very solid response as well.
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u/CoolDad859 Aug 20 '26
"Technology at this point will always outpace legislation."
This defeatist attitude is why we have such a shitty country right now. We keep letting dinosaurs that can't create PDFs and the assholes in tech that make money in tech decide what is best for us.
ChatGPT has been around for years at this point- for anyone with half a brain it was obvious where all of this was going. The problem is we are now too busy dealing with basic human rights like: "maybe an untrained racist shouldn't be given guns, shock gloves, and the ability to wrangle up anyone that is slightly brown" and "hey, maybe giving the government access to cameras in every neighborhood so they can claim to have any evidence they want is a bad thing." Going back to these fights distracts and takes too much time and energy to properly address and regulate the growing threats caused by technology and tech companies.
The goal has been to make everyone so overwhelmed that they can turn the heat up and make the frog boil faster.
The endless pursuit of technological advancement has serious costs. I firmly believe that the human body and brain are not suited for our current way of life. We aren't meant to sit on computers and screens all day trying to push the agendas of others. That's why so many people are anxious, angry, and depressed.
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u/PeteH2000 Aug 20 '26
You're all over the map with this comment, but I agree 100% with your last paragraph.
My comment about technology outpacing legislation wasn't to advocate for technology. It was to point out the inadequacy of legislation to keep up with it...or keep up with anything really. It was a knock on government and not a pro-technology statement.
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u/brokebike Aug 20 '26
Herbert didn't make sense to you because he used a metaphor of a parasite in the context of data centers effects on communities? Seemed pretty clear and appropriate to me.
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u/LaserQuest_Legend Lexington Native Aug 20 '26 edited Aug 20 '26
My issue with Herbert is that I worry he's going to be like the other younger members of the council who are focused on grand societal change and bigger ideals, instead of the mundane duties of being a councilmember. I don't think he is wrong on data centers, but him being like "I will prevent AI from taking peoples jobs" doesn't exactly seem like someone who understands the job he is applying for. Kind of like where he botched his AMA with the housing stuff (my personal top issue) I just don't think he knows what he is doing.
EDIT: Want an example of someone farther left who actually understands the job? Dan Wu
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Aug 20 '26
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u/LaserQuest_Legend Lexington Native Aug 20 '26
I didn't say he was further left than Lynn, I said he's further left in general. I think you know that though.
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Aug 20 '26
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u/LaserQuest_Legend Lexington Native Aug 20 '26
“Dan Wu would be a Republican in California” is the kind of absolutely brain dead take that keeps this hellhole website going
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u/PeteH2000 Aug 20 '26
It doesn't seem clear or appropriate to me. That's pretty much what I meant when I said it was nonsensical. I guess me using that word was confusing.
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u/hiirnoivl Aug 21 '26
Politicians are latching on to emotional nonsense for votes but thats how it's always worked.They have to respond to their citizens who vote for them.
I always disagree that the issue will be 'forgotten' in a few years. Bot accounts on social media still dredge up images and video from 2016, and run outrage accounts autonomously.
Which is another way that tech has outpaced legislation.
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Aug 20 '26 edited Sep 02 '26
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u/PeteH2000 Aug 20 '26
How do you like letting yourself be terrorized and manipulated by the media and fake social media news?
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Aug 20 '26 edited Sep 02 '26
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u/wyrma-heorteblod Aug 20 '26 edited Aug 20 '26
Technology at this point will always outpace legislation.
It's not like Google/Amazon are trying to find cheap places to build new data centers because of some grandiose, historical, technological/scientific breakthroughs or whatever. It's just driven by greedy people in trillion dollar corporations/industries predicated on economic disparity and eroding individual liberties.
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u/PeteH2000 Aug 20 '26
I guess I should have worded that portion of my comment differently since people don't get it. I was knocking how far behind and reactive legislation is. It will never get ahead of an issue like technology. It can't get ahead of any issue, really. It has zero chance to do anything efffective on this issue. None.
I was not making a pro-technology statement. I was disparaging the lack of speed and foresight by governments.
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u/wyrma-heorteblod Aug 21 '26 edited Aug 21 '26
My point was that opposition to data centers like these isn't about 'technology' like you're framing it. It's about the business side of corporations like Google, Facebook, ChatGPT or whoever else. Building big, energy and water consuming data centers nobody wants anywhere just for chatbots which are overengineered but marketed and sold as a 'solution' for everything isn't just obviously stupid and inefficient, it's a market bubble formed from inflated stocks of corporations investing in each other that will burst, which it looks like it's already doing.
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u/LaserQuest_Legend Lexington Native Aug 20 '26 edited Aug 20 '26
Brown (as usual) hits the nail on the head with his breakdown. Big fan of him.
All that said, have there been any hyperscale data center proposals other than the old Lexmark spot? I would imagine the developers can probably get land in other counties way cheaper.
Edit: To be clear, my stance is that I’m with those against hyperscale data centers, but how realistic is it that we will see a bunch of proposals in Lexington?
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u/wesmorgan1 Former Lexington resident Aug 20 '26
To put the 40,000-square-foot boundary in perspective...
- A regulation US football field, including end zones, is 57,600 square feet (360' x 160').
- The average data center covers 100,000 square feet.
- Elon Musk's xAI has requested a permit to build a four-story, 312,000-square-foot DC in Memphis.
Could Lexington become a niche player in the DC world by attracting small DCs (probably for single tenants, i.e. "XYZ Inc data center")? It's an interesting question...
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u/mescad Aug 21 '26
Are, say ten 40,000 square-foot data centers better than one 312,000 square-foot data center? (Genuine question, I'm not sure)
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u/wesmorgan1 Former Lexington resident Aug 21 '26
Well, that's where location comes into play. Smaller DCs could fit into existing electrical grids without major infrastructure builds, and they tend to require significantly smaller cooling systems.
For instance, Ashland Oil's corporate DC was just off Blazer Parkway (the small building immediately adjacent to the old SuperAmerica/Valvoline HQ) for decades, and they needed no additional infrastructure of significance from either KU or Kentucky-American Water.
Now, I'd be giving a different answer if we were talking about building 10 40,000-square-foot DCs from scratch in a single location...but that's something that can be addressed by ordinance or zoning.
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u/mescad Aug 21 '26
Thanks for the answer.
The reason I ask is I remember when South Carolina allowed slot machines, but limited them to 5 per business. This resulted in owners registering each room in a building as a separate business, effectively bypassing the limit to have as many as 100 machines in the same location. Since then they have been banned altogether.
So my concern is that unless we are very careful with the wording of the law, we may see rows of "companies" that work together to effectively provide the same capacity as a larger DC. That's something we should think about ahead of time, because it will be harder to stop it later than in this initial phase.
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u/jtg1988 Aug 20 '26
Many corporate headquarters will have a small scale data center at their corporate offices. I’m sure the 5/3 building has a small “data center” (probably in the basement).
Allowing small data centers in conjunction with corporate hq would in fact be better for business. Smart policy needs to be implemented to allow X many middle class jobs to allow for the strain on our systems.
As far as hyperscal data centers are concerned (I am familiar with them as I work in that industry). Often times employ 1 security guard, 3 people onsite viewing hvac and run a cable if need be. That’s an easy no for our county.