A New Economic Boost for South Dakota
by Rep. Kent Roe
WOW! Deuel County, District 4 and the whole state may just be in for the largest economic boost we’re ever seen.
$4,300,000,000.00 – 200 plus jobs – $13,000,000.00 in payroll.
Yep. Count the zeros. That’s $4.3 BILLION.
First on the public agenda this morning at the Deuel County Commissioners meeting was Applied Digital, a Dallas TX based company. We met yesterday afternoon in anticipation of their presentation this morning. This is the same company currently constructing the data center in Ellendale ND.
There’s a lot to pack in here. Their proposal is to construct, on private land, a 900,000 square foot data center. Applied Digital is the “landlord” and they lease space to clients who use the facility. In this case, the site is anticipated to be leased to an AI company. This data center would cost approximately $4.3 billion. That’s a big number. BIG. NUMBER. We’re working with Applied Digital and also Dickey County in North Dakota as to how to establish the assessed value of an animal like this. Suffice it to say, the property tax generated by this economic powerhouse will likely be north of $5,000,000.00 a year. (I’m using Amtec in Deuel County to speculate on this. Their assessed value is $2.9 million and their tax load is about $50,000- from public record) Meaningful, especially to Deuel County.
More? 200 jobs. Applied Digital, in their presentation to the Deuel County Commissioners, posits the very high likelihood that these 200 jobs will pay an ~$65,000 year average wage/salary. More math, that’s ~$13,000,000.00 in payroll.
More? Yep. The energy consumed by the data center is taxed at 4.2%. The data center will consume either side of 100 megawatts of electricity. That’s more than the city of Watertown highest days use EVER. Sales tax revenue generated by this entrepreneur will be steady, reliable and constant. Every dollar they spend on electricity will PAY the state 4.2%.
More? In typical economies 7 jobs from one source will typically create an additional job nearby but unrelated to the host. So, it’s likely the non-direct jobs creation would be another 25+ jobs for entrepreneurs. Enterprises like daycare, bowling alleys, convenience stores, accountants, attorneys, etc.
More? This big idea presents opportunity for people. It creates competition in the labor market. Brings capital into the area. Creates more opportunities for our kids. Proves that South Dakota is open for business.
The downside: Plenty of people will peck away at this, I’ll let them have their fun. At the end of the day this is a winner.
I plan on working with Applied Digital, the Governor, the legislature, Deuel County and all interested parties to make this work. But it will take an effort by all to land this plane. Our legislature needs to create a long term and enduring platform for Applied Digital, and, additional enterprises, to work from.
We cannot go changing the rules midway through the process. I believe we can benefit immensely from the enterprise.
Join me in supporting a great guest. Let’s be the type of host we can count on.
I sincerely wish you and your district the best in this endeavor. The legislature last session was openly hostile to the idea of data centers, as you know
The legislature was hostile to economic development, period.
Evacuate Watertown, a hazmat fire is coming soon !!!
The fire dept. won’t be able to put the fire out. It will have to burn itself out. A few months ago a fire in Ca. caused heavy metal contamination to the region. These are the same batteries used in the data center. Do yourself a favor and search for “Moss landing fire”.
What will the zoning setback be ?
https://ctif.org/news/fire-largest-bess-us-led-evacuation-1500-residents-near-moss-landing-fire-left-burn-out
AWS will be a nice target for terrorists, or ground zero for WW3. NIMBY
If ignorance is bliss, you must be living in one blissful world. Not even two minutes on Google and you can find out that data centers primarily use lead acid batteries. Also, the fire you’re talking about was at the largest batter energy storage system in the world. Which isn’t even remotely comparable to a data center. Stop the fear mongering.
There is also a decent likelihood you had some thick sarcasm spread on that one. If so, touché.
Most of those jobs will go to “out of town people” and most of those jobs will go away when construction is complete.
Bob, you’re sock-puppeting. Pick a handle and stick with it.
It would be swell if some of the people in the District numbered 30 had the opportunity to move over there by Watertown and work in this fancy data mining cloud dreaming place. Anything that reduces the population here but cranks up the economy elsewhere in the state is good by grudznick.
What sort of “long term and enduring platform” exactly?
The nuclear kind. The state can’t produce enough power to meet the need. They’re going to need their own power plant.
Hold your horses. Lems, Hansen, Radke & Auch will be there to put an end to this economic boost nonsense.
Don’t forget to mention the “unborns” they will protect from this.
What an exciting opportunity for Deuel County and South Dakota. I hope it comes to fruition and Applied Digital is treated fairly and respectfully.
Can someone explain to me how the legislature would block this or be against it?
The most I’ve seen is they won’t pass some kind of law exempting data centers from sales tax on software purchases?
This seems to be a far cry from banning data centers?
I notice “triple D Jordan” is not in the picture. (DDD – DumDumDylan)
That did not escape my attention either.
He might be busy going back & forth between protesting it and filling out an application to sweep up the place.
Just googled this company…they started as a crypto miner which is a red flag already. Now their stock is plummeting as they missed sales targets. As an unprofitable company I think it’s highly dubious that they’ll come up with 4 Billion dollars to spend in SD. Sounds to me like some smoke was blown up some backsides.
This company’s insiders appear to want to sell their shares…all of them, including the CEO. It’s growth rate is an “F.” Beware before jumping in.
One word: TruShrimp
I think it’s comical how we say “free market” and “we don’t pick winners and losers” but then the second someone shows interest, politicians bend over backwards and offer concessions and TIFs and private land to accommodate their wishes.
If you don’t fully understand tifs and how they work, don’t bring them up. They really don’t fit your argument very well.
I don’t want to throw cold water on this but I wouldn’t get your hopes up. This isn’t AWS.
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/why-applied-digital-apld-shares-171123512.html
With cheap abundant wind energy, decent ping times from both coasts and a halfway decent fiber infrastructure, these should be a great industry as it’s easier to import/export bits than building the high voltage electric lines to export cheap wind.
However the boomers are probably going to fight this just because.
Love to see more info on these projects but hard to find.