A significant development in Southwest Virginia's emerging data center recruitment efforts has unfolded as multiple counties have come together to express their collective support for attracting data centers to the region. With a shared vision of fostering economic growth, the counties of Lee, Scott, Wise, Dickenson and the City of Norton (Membership of the Lonesome Pine Regional Industrial Facilities Authority) have passed resolutions highlighting their commitment to welcoming data center investments.

The Southwest Virginia member localities of the Lonesome Pine Regional Industrial Facilities Authority (Lonesome Pine RIFA), including Dickenson County, Lee County, City of Norton, Scott County, and Wise County, announced today an agreement on what will be the Commonwealth’s lowest regional property tax rate on data center equipment. The regional partnership will be implementing a tax rate of $0.24 per $100 of assessed value with a favorable depreciation schedule, taking into account the capital cost of equipment and frequency of server replacement. This unified approach strengthens the region’s business case and opens up the opportunity for revenue sharing.

Will Payne, director of InvestSWVA and managing partner of Coalfield Strategies, says local counties are poised to change their tax structures, and the University of Virginia’s College at Wise and community colleges can provide training for most data center jobs. “We see our competition not as Northern Virginia but Central Virginia,” Payne says. “Southwest Virginia may not be for every data center, but it is the right location for the right data center, especially someone focused on leveraging the region’s solar and geothermal assets to deliver on their sustainability goals.”

Now that these assets have been identified and verified, it’s up to our regional governments and economic development leaders to move forward in sharing what Southwest Virginia has to offer with those who can make these data centers happen. The time is ripe, and the need is real.

Data centers — lured by the promise of reduced cooling costs from water down in the mines but that still would demand lower-cost electricity — could jump-start the demand for renewable energy in a part of the country that until now has seen green energy as the enemy.

That’s why this is such a fascinating report. It’s in the form of a feasibility study but really offers a way to speak to two different audiences. First, it offers up talking points for a sales pitch to those tech companies — Southwest Virginia has some unique, environmentally friendly ways to help save you energy and cut costs. Second, it delivers a message to the region that it needs to present itself in a different way. The report says Southwest should consistently talk up the “region’s desire to transform itself from a coal producing area to an innovative renewable energy hub.”

As Dominion Energy continues to evaluate whether a $2 billion renewable energy project will come to Tazewell County, the company is also partnering with Appalachian Power (AEP) and InvestSWWA to advance energy storage technology in Southwest Virginia.

Goals for storing renewable energy in the Commonwealth of Virginia this week led Appalachian Power and Dominion Energy to forge a public-private partnership with InvestSWVA, a marketing campaign sponsored by the Virginia Tobacco Region Revitalization Commission.

New breweries, cideries, and distilleries are springing up all over southwest Virginia, creating a booming new industry. Now, there is a project to make the entire brewing process more local.

Virginia electric utility giants Appalachian Power and Dominion Energy Inc. announced Tuesday a public-private partnership with InvestSWVA that aims to expand renewable energy storage technology and attract industry prospects in Southwest Virginia.

The availability of billions of gallons of water at that temperature “could potentially provide a sustainable and cost-effective cooling solution for a data center operator,” according to the study. Based on the Upper Banner results, using mine water “could reduce the electricity required for cooling the data center by 90 percent.” Also, it would “substantially eliminate the need for the purchase of large volumes of municipal water that would be evaporated through cooling towers in a conventional mechanical cooling system.”

Southwest Virginia has a number of assets that could be used to help recruit data centers to the region, a new study shows. The study sought third-party validation for GO Virginia Region One to become a location of choice for data centers based on power and broadband infrastructure and the availability of geothermal cooling technology with the billions of gallons of water collected in underground mines as an energy and cost-savings tool, according to a written statement.

One year after its start, economic development initiative InvestSWVA and state economic agency GO Virginia have completed their first joint project — a roster of potential data center sites using underground mines for cooling and power savings. Will Payne, project leader for the assessment, said Monday that Project Oasis — the evaluation and identification of those sites — gives Southwest Virginia governments and economic development organizations a basis for talking to prospective data center operations and competing with two areas of Virginia for those operations.

Southwest Virginia is well-positioned for data centers and a large data center could result in more than 2,000 jobs and $50 million in annual economic activity, according to the Project Oasis study conducted by OnPoint Development Strategies and released Monday by InvestSWVA.