MILLERSPORT, Ohio – Lorrie Hoover stood before a standing-room crowd Monday, accusing the artificial intelligence and natural gas industries of trying to turn Buckeye Lake into their “exhaust pipe.”
Even the fiercest critics filling up the cafeteria at the town’s combined middle and high school building in Fairfield County seemed to accept as a foregone conclusion that Vantage Data Centers, of Denver, was going to build its $2.1 billion “OH2” facility on 500 acres of former farmland about a mile away.
Ohio’s local communities for years now have been resisting the rush of new data centers built in their neighborhoods – fights that almost always end in failure for the resistant locals.
But the scene at the school – home of, appropriately, the Lakers – focused less on the data center than the 40 natural gas fired turbines, 132 diesel generators, and industrial-scale battery system to power the whole thing, and the tons of carbon, nitrogen and sulfur oxide emissions that would follow.
If the power station fed into the grid instead of the data center, it would provide enough power for as many as a million homes. Instead, it’s all for Vantage. State policymakers and the technology industry see this “behind the meter” power as the solution to the spike in electric bills that’s commonly associated with the electricity-starved data centers.
But the Fairfield County locals say the new deal leaves them stuck breathing in the pollutive downside.
The plant is estimated by Oil and Gas Watch to discharge 1,600 tons of air pollutants and 6.6 million tons of carbon dioxide, equal to about 1.4 million cars driven over the course of a year. (Developers, the Ohio Power Siting Board and the Ohio EPA all declined to provide specific emissions estimates.) Such pollutants have long been understood as contributors to respiratory and cardiovascular diseases, cancer, and adverse maternal and infant health outcomes.
And it’s all playing out in Millersport, which sits on Buckeye Lake, a 3,100 acre reservoir (and floating cranberry bog) and a popular tourist draw in Central Ohio. It’s a fishing hub and the kind of place you can drive a boat up to a bar.
That’s why, to Hoover, it’s a nuisance in the making.
“There is no local necessity to have a private, 1,350-megawatt fossil fuel generating station. It’s tech infrastructure dumping noise, heat and air pollution onto our families,” Hoover said.
“It’s our right to breathe clean air.”
Gas developers dive into the data center wars
Since Jan. 1, 2025, developers have sought permits for eight new “behind the meter” natural gas-fired power plants, representing billions of dollars and millions of tons of new air emissions. Fruits of the power stations go to the likes of Meta in New Albany or EdgeConnex in Ashville.
None of them have anything on what OpenAI is claiming will be the biggest data center in America, in Piketon, Ohio, accompanied by an 8,000 megawatt gas plant which, if built, would be the largest in the U.S. and cost a staggering $500 billion in total.
In Millersport, regulators with the Ohio Power Siting Board were there to determine whether to grant a permit to Advanced Power, a Boston-based natural gas developer building the power plant. Specifically, the board was there in part to determine whether the plant meets the “public interest, convenience and necessity.”
New laws designed to accelerate the bureaucratic timeline for these projects require the OPSB to rule within 195 days of receiving an application, making for a Nov. 26 deadline.
Most of the rhetoric in Millersport’s public hearing focused more on provincial issues like Buckeye Lake and the rural aesthetics than on climate change or the global AI race. Many of the locals were specific about emissions so close to schools, playgrounds and families.
Others said the developers and local governments ignored widespread resistance from the community since the development was publicly announced in May 2025 and seemingly rushed through the development process.
The out-of-state developers and imported labor don’t have a vested interest in the community, said Wayne Harris, of Pleasantville, about 7 miles south. He said it’s unfair to see tax breaks for the developers.
State officials have granted a 50% sales tax exemption to Vantage on costs associated with the project through 2035, which can include costs associated with the gas plant. That alone is worth at least $83 million according to self-described lowball estimates from state economic officials.
Plus, new legislation passed in early 2025 designed to attract new gas generators to Ohio gives them huge property tax discounts by lowering assessment values of both the generating equipment and the batteries.
“We don’t get tax abatements,” Harris said. “Our taxes go up.”
Advanced Power was present for the public hearing, but per OPSB rules and procedures, didn’t speak. A spokesperson declined to provide an official for interview or answer several written questions posed by Signal Statewide.
Ohio unions come out for Big Tech
Most of the support for the project came from union members who expect to build and service both the gas and data center operation.
Heads of local chapters of the operating engineers, electrical workers, plumbers, truck drivers, pipefitters and carpenters said the project is bringing high-paying and respectable work. Union tradesmen in the area said building big projects in Ohio means members can work close to home instead of traveling.
Developers for the power plant told the OPSB they expect to create about 6,600 construction jobs over a three-year period and 20 long-term direct operational jobs. More indirect employment is expected from jobs along the supply chain and spillover effects into the area.
And the data center itself said it’s providing 2,500 skilled construction jobs and at least 50 permanent, full-time operational jobs.
Several mentioned the property tax benefits that will go to schools, police and fire authorities. Dorsey Hager, the executive secretary treasurer for the central ohio Building and Construction Trades Council, drove more than an hour from a Columbus suburb to speak up for the project. Both operations will pump tax money into the town. And unlike most of the data centers in Ohio, this one won’t contribute to the demand spike that’s driving power prices upward.
“As data centers continue to expand because of the growing demand for artificial intelligence and other high-tech industries, it is important that new development also brings infrastructure to support its own energy needs,” he said.
The union presence drew out an urban-rural divide. Most of the union representatives identified themselves as coming from Columbus or its suburbs – not Millersport or anywhere near the site of the gas plant.
While skilled tradesmen made up most of the support, a few others joined them.
Matthew Santurello, of Thornville, Ohio, a few miles east of the facilities, is a supervisor with Securitas, which provides private security services for Vantage’s data center.
He said he gets it – “no one likes data centers.” But economic growth means good jobs in an inflationary economy and a job market saturated with low-paying and menial work.
“As a 25-year-old in today’s community, working retail or anywhere else, we can’t afford to buy houses,” he said.
“I’m just putting that out there. We can’t afford to buy anything nowadays. These jobs at the data centers are providing us with more income to support families.”