The Military Installation Development Authority will build hyperscale data centers in Box Elder County as part of its new Stratos Project Area.
MIDA is the state entity created to serve the military and foster economic development. In the Wasatch Back, it’s known for facilitating Deer Valley East Village.
At a board meeting Friday, April 24, Executive Director Paul Morris said Stratos will be MIDA’s most ambitious project to date.
“For many years, MIDA itself – this organization – had the No. 1 and No. 2 economic development projects in the state of Utah,” he said. “And what we’re about to talk about is a project that, if you took our No. 1 and our No. 2 and you added them together and then multiplied them times 10, it will not touch what we’re about to talk about, in opportunity and benefit for the state of Utah.”
Within Box Elder County, the project includes 40,000 acres of privately owned land, 1,200 acres of military and state-owned land and part of the Utah Test and Training Range. Plus, military land including the entire Hill Air Force Base, the Falcon Hill Project Area and over two dozen sites around the state that make up the Utah National Guard Project Area, will be “associated with” the new Stratos project.
The developer is O’Leary Digital Utah Development Company, with TV personality Kevin O’Leary, who’s known as “Mr. Wonderful,” at the helm. The project will be marketed as “Wonder Valley.”
He is also developing a $70 billion artificial intelligence data center with the same name in Alberta, Canada.
O’Leary told the MIDA board Friday the project is an effort to compete with China to power AI data centers.
“My job is going to tell the world what we’ve done here and what we’re going to do here and set an example for everybody in America that this is what it takes to compete with the Chinese,” he said.
Senate Pres. Stuart Adams, the chair of the MIDA board, said “the country that controls AI will control the world.”
“We’re in an arms race for AI technology, and we need to step up,” he said. “We need to wake up the sleeping giant of American capitalism and expertise, and that’s what we’re doing here.”
Morris said the project will promote AI generally, but also support the Pentagon, the Department of Defense, the U.S. Air Force and the Utah National Guard.
“This is a national security imperative to get this done,” he said.
The Stratos development agreement says Phase 1 of Wonder Valley will generate about three gigawatts of energy, and the total project will have a capacity of nine gigawatts.
A single gigawatt of power is roughly how much energy a city of 1.8 million people consumes in a year, according to a CNBC analysis.
Morris pushed back on common arguments against data centers: that they use too much power and water and don’t create jobs. He said the Stratos project will create 100% of the power it needs and use less water than ranching.
“Instead of using the evaporative coolers of old data centers, it is this closed loop where they clean the water up, and then they have it run through to do the cooling, and then they put it back into the aquifer that can go to the Great Salt Lake,” he said. “They believe that the water rights that they’re buying, that they will lose less water than was used for the ranching, and so there’ll be a net positive to the Great Salt Lake.”
At a Box Elder County Commission meeting Wednesday, April 22, several residents said they were concerned about how MIDA’s plans would affect their community.
Rancher LuAnn Adams said she didn’t fully understand how her family’s land would be affected by the project.
“Earlier, they said, ‘Shh, don’t tell anybody, don’t tell anybody,’” she said. “So, I kept it to myself for a little while, and then – anyway, we’re not interested in selling our property at this time, and we want to be protected for what we have in the future.”
She said she was worried about water pollution and noise.
Another resident, Rick Ellis, said the “lack of transparency” concerns him.
“We've heard the sales pitch, the patriotic heartstrings,” he said. “That's all fine and great, but we need to make darn sure that it benefits us.”
Tim Munns said he decided to support the project after asking a lot of questions. He said some of his land is included in the project.
“After weighing if or not it could be stopped, by the time we [came] in there, this goose was hatched and this turkey was cooked. It looked like, to me, it was either watch what's happening or be involved. So, we chose to be involved.”
Others said the economic benefits to the county will be worth it.
When Phase 1 is complete, MIDA estimates Box Elder County will receive about $30 million in revenue every year. When the entire project is finished, the county could see up to $108 million annually.
The timeline for “Wonder Valley” has not yet been announced.
