KSHB 41 reporter Isabella Ledonne reports on stories about government accountability. This story follows the Data, Dollars and Demand series and Isabella's extensive reporting on data centers in the metro. Share your story idea with Isabella.
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Kansas City, Missouri, is moving forward with plans to build a potentially $2 billion water treatment plant. It would be the second plant KC Water has in the city limits.
As part of our previous reporting in Data, Dollars and Demand, KSHB 41 News learned that data centers are expected to use millions of gallons of water a day.
Kansas City's existing water treatment plant in Briarcliff has the capacity to pump 240 million gallons of water a day. According to KC Water, the current treatment plant serves the current city's demands well, but it’s turning 100 years old.
The city is starting the process to add a new treatment facility that would increase overall water capacity for customers, including four massive hyperscale data centers in the Northland.
However, some in the metro community have concerns about the impact these institutions can bring to the community.
"We cannot continue to have these data centers coming in here, using up all of our scarce resources," Platte County presiding commissioner Scott Fricker said. "They have to increase generation capacity and do massive capital improvements to the grid to support these data centers. And the people are going to pay for that."
KSHB 41 News reporter Isabella Ledonne sat down with Commissioner Fricker regarding his concerns following KC Water's announcement of a new water treatment plant.
"It's not surprising," Fricker said. "Where are they going to get the water for all these data centers?"
A new water treatment plant could be going in Kansas City's East Bottoms in the next five to ten years. It's expected to add capacity of 60 million to 240 million gallons of water a day and could cost anywhere between $600 million and $2 billion.
"We're not really aware of a city that's over half a million people, that only has one water treatment plant, so we're a little atypical," KC Water's interim deputy director of engineering, Blake Anderson, said. "It's just a risk for us having only one plant.”
That risk comes from the existing plant's age and infrastructure.
“Concrete in general is designed only to last 100 years," Anderson said. "To keep that plant going as is, we're going to have to invest substantial amounts of work in keeping those structures up to date in repairs.”
A new water plant isn't the only massive development happening in Kansas City. Meta's hyperscale data center came online at the end of August. KSHB 41 News found out that once fully completed, it's expected to use 9.5 million gallons of water a day.
KC Water previously stated that Kansas City has the capacity to handle the additional water demands.
"There won't be any impact," division manager of water distribution engineering David Poirier said. "We have plenty of water here in Kansas City, so don't worry about the water running out."
Data centers use a high volume of water to keep the servers and software from overheating using cooling technology. It's led some experts to question the reliability of the resource in a community where there are multiple hyperscale data centers.
"The main challenge, I believe, is the uncertainty," Yury Dvorkin, professor of electrical and computer engineering at Johns Hopkins University, said. "The more load you have, regardless of the nature of this load, the more burden you impose on infrastructure."
But it's not just Meta using millions of gallons of water a day.
Google's billion-dollar campus in the Northland started its water service on Sept. 1. Port KC gave the green light to two other hyperscale data centers in the Northland, known as Project Mica and Project Kestrel. Those campuses are expected to span hundreds of acres and cost up to $100 billion.
"It's pretty clear to me that it's not a good deal for Platte County," Fricker said.
Commissioner Fricker isn't in favor of Project Kestrel, the $100 billion data center development proposed to go by the Kansas City airport.
“There's very few people who work in those data centers, so it's not like they're a big employment generator," Fricker said. "I can't figure out exactly why it's such a great deal for Platte County.”
One of Fricker's main concerns is where the massive institutions will get the required water and electricity to run 24/7.
“How could that not impact the city's water supply? How can the city just absorb that kind of usage without adding new facilities?" Fricker said. "I don't know how that's possible.”
KSHB 41 News reporter Isabella Ledonne took those concerns to KC Water following their announcement of a second water treatment plant in the city.
According to Anderson, the demand for a second water treatment plant isn't directly related to the demand for data centers.
"I know what our current max day demands are," Anderson said. "I know what our projections are, and we have capacity for all the data center agreements we've signed with our existing treatment plant.”
Anderson emphasized during the interview that data center development is not pushing the demand for a new treatment plant.
"If the data centers were driving the production, that would almost be easier, because then I'd have additional customers, additional demand, and revenue to pay for it," Anderson said.
How Kansas City is going to pay for a new water treatment plant with a potentially $2 billion price tag is another concern for Fricker and his community.
“Who's going to pay for the construction of these new water facilities?” Fricker said.
KC Water says they plan to apply for state and federal grants to fund the construction and not put it back on customers.
"We will not use rates to fund the construction of this project," Anderson said.
KC Water is looking for public feedback as they start the design process for the water plant.
More in-depth coverage of data center developments in the metro can be found here.
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