Data Centers

The term “data center” encompasses a variety of purposes for facilities that deal with computing technology and/or information technology.

For our local planning and development purposes, the City adopted this definition in 2022:

A use consisting of buildings or structures specifically designed or modified to house networked computers and data and transaction processing equipment and related infrastructure support equipment, including power and cooling equipment. A data center may be used to provide data and transaction processing services, outsource information technology services and/or computer equipment colocation services. A data center may also include buildings or structures that support the operation of the data center including retrofit buildings, warehousing for logistics, independent network buildings, buildings for support staff, and emergency generators.

A Data Center shall not include activities which consistently produce noise discernable at the property line. Should a Data Center produce noise discernable at the property line, it shall be classified as an Industrial use.

Data centers can range from small, modular operations that are less than 5,000 square feet (about the size of a large 5-bedroom home) to large “hyperscale” facilities.

“Hyperscale” is generally considered as a data center with at least 5,000 servers and more than 10,000 square feet. The largest hyperscale data centers can be well over 100,000 square feet (the Meta data center in Cheyenne is planned to be 715,000 square feet).

Source - IBM

Source - CoreSite

Source – Data Center Frontier

Source - RPA

Data centers are a key component of internet technology. Nearly all websites and apps, including this website, ultimately rely on data centers.

Data centers can cover a range of uses, from cloud computing and storage (ex. when someone saves a file to online storage), to artificial intelligence computer modeling.

Source - RPA

Data centers can either be owned and operated by a single entity (ex. Microsoft or Meta) or built and maintained by a company that then leases out server space to other companies.

Source - RPA

Cheyenne is an attractive place for data center developers due to:

• Climate: At 6,000 feet, Cheyenne’s climate is cooler than many locations, allowing for reduced cooling costs for servers and even allowing for air cooling during the winter months.
• Connectivity: Cheyenne has easy access to high-capacity fiber lines that move through the area.
• Disaster risk: Cheyenne is prone to fewer natural disasters than other areas.
• Economic climate: Cheyenne and Wyoming have historically offered a reliable, favorable business climate for businesses of all types.
• Electricity: Cheyenne has access to stable electricity sources. Wyoming is a net exporter of electricity.

According to Cheyenne LEADS, as of May 2026, 10 data centers of all sizes are operational in Cheyenne. Five are under construction, and nine are in various stages of planning, though no construction has taken place.

Smaller data centers include Lunavi, which is in the Cheyenne Business Parkway, while larger facilities include Meta in the High Plains Business Park.

One of the earliest projects that could be considered a data center was EchoStar’s satellite uplink center in Cheyenne that was built in 1994. EchoStar later expanded, adding a data center that opened in 2011.

Green House Data, now Lunavi, was formed in 2007 and has since expanded. The NCAR – Wyoming Supercomputing Center opened in 2012.

In 2012, Microsoft built its first data center in Cheyenne. During Gov. Matt Mead’s administration, attracting data centers to Wyoming was prioritized as a way for the state to expand its tax base.

There has been an increased demand for data centers both nationally and internationally in recent years as computing needs continue to increase. Cloud-based computing and new interest in artificial intelligence has spurred the growth of the data center industry.

Black Hills Energy customers are protected from rate increases due to data center development through BHE’s Large Power Contract Service Tariff. This “tariff” requires data centers to pay for their own electricity infrastructure to connect to the grid.

An example of a public notice about a data center funding such infrastructure can be found on the Wyoming Public Service Commission’s website.

Read more about this tariff from Black Hills Energy.

Data centers’ use of servers generates heat, and those servers need to be cooled down to prevent their failure. Historically, data centers used evaporative cooling, which used less electricity but high amounts of water.

The industry is trending toward closed loop cooling. Closed loop cooling circulates water and coolant through closed pipes. This system must be filled initially and then is topped off every few years. This prevents a data center from using a high amount of water. Once the system is full, a data center will only use about as much water annually as an office building.

Cheyenne has rights to about 22,000 acre-feet of water per year and currently uses around 11,300 acre-feet annually.

BOPU plays a specific and vital role in the approval of new residential, commercial, and industrial development. When approached by a developer, BOPU must first determine its ability to serve the proposed development. Through the use of capacity forecasting, hydraulic modeling, and industry recognized references, BOPU will validate proposed demand and its capacity to serve.

BOPU has developed standards and specifications to ensure new development is constructed in a way that does not harm current customers and ensures infrastructure useful life is maximized. One example is closed-loop cooling in all new developing data center campuses. Transitioning from open-loop, evaporative cooling, to closed-loop systems reduces annual demand per data center from approximately 15 acre feet (5 million gallons) to roughly 1.2 acre feet (400,000 gallons) of water, assuming a system flush and refill every three years.

Within city limits, the Board of Public Utilities is able to monitor water usage by all of its customers. In 2025, All operational data centers in Cheyenne used about 93 million gallons or approximately 2% of all water used in the city annually.

BOPU requires meter installation prior to occupancy. BOPU's metering system is designed to monitor and flag extreme overuse for further review, which could ultimately lead to service disconnection until the issue is resolved. This applies to all customers, including data centers.

A chart showing water usage in Cheyenne by usage type is below:

Cheyenne has always planned for the growth of the community. Planning begins with long-range documents like PlanCheyenne. These documents help guide zoning, which is what is allowable in different parts of the City.

Currently, data centers are a use-by-right in four zones: Business Park, Light Industrial, Heavy Industrial, and Mixed-Use Employment. Data centers could be allowed in Neighborhood Business, Community Business, Central Business District, and Mixed-Use Business zones, but any proposal in those zones would carry other restrictions and require conditional use approval by the City’s Board of Adjustment.

Data centers are never allowed in agricultural or residential zones.

The City’s engagement website, Connect Cheyenne, features development actions that come before the City’s Planning and Development Department. These actions include items like annexations, rezonings, conditional uses, and site plans.

Residents are invited to provide feedback on development projects through the Connect Cheyenne portal and can attend public meetings about development projects. These are typically through the City’s Planning Commission, which meets up to twice per month; the Board of Adjustment, which meets once per month; and City Council, which meets twice per month in addition to Council’s committee meetings.

It’s important to note that a development action like an annexation or business park rezoning does not necessarily mean the development is specifically for data centers. 

Construction of data centers employ hundreds to thousands of workers, many of which are in skilled trades. Once construction is complete, data centers typically employ a few dozen engineers plus additional support staff. Microsoft, for example, employs more than 200 people at its existing built-out data centers in Cheyenne.

Data centers pay property taxes as well as franchise fees and sales taxes on electricity.

Due to the high value of improvements on a data center site, each data center can contribute hundreds of thousands of dollars in property taxes annually. In city limits, property taxes are distributed to the City, Laramie County, LCCC, the Laramie County Library, the Laramie County Conservation District, the Weed and Pest Control District, and other school funds and the county fair. 

These additional revenues allow the City, County, and other agencies to provide improved and expanded services to residents without any rate increases for residents.

Yes. Several data center companies have made charitable contributions in Cheyenne and Laramie County. Some examples are:

- Microsoft has sponsored 56 community initiatives, including hundreds of “gutter bins” that prevent trash and other debris from entering the City’s stormwater system and Crow Creek, as well as sponsoring hundreds of trees planted in Cheyenne through Rooted in Cheyenne. In 2019, Microsoft partnered with LCCC to launch the Datacenter Academy, which helps train students for jobs in data centers and has already trained more than 1,000 students.

- Meta has contributed through its Community Action Grant program. These grants have gone to local organizations. In 2026, more than a dozen organizations received grants. Meta has also sponsored other community initiatives and events.

- Finally, Related Digital donated $3.5 million to the City to assist with affordable and attainable housing efforts. This funding will help bridge the gap for developments to move forward that will help lower-income community members afford a place to live in Cheyenne.