Nobles County Board votes against zoning change, preventing massive data centers
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The Nobles County Board of Commissioners voted Tuesday to reject a zoning change that would allow data centers to be built on farmland.
A standing room only crowd at the Nobles County Government Center applauded the 3-2 vote, which will, for now, prevent any data centers from being developed in the southwestern Minnesota county. The vote delivers a blow to Geronimo Power’s $4 billion plan to build a data center complex on about 950 acres of farmland just east of Reading and north of Worthington.
Geronimo Power’s president Blake Nixon did not say what the company will do now but did suggest it could find another home for its data center project in the region.
“We appreciate the board's time and effort in looking at it and the community's feedback,” Nixon told MPR News. “We've always said that if the community doesn't want it, we're not going to force it on the community, and even though there is a lot of support for it, if the community is telling us consistently that there's serious concerns or that they don't want it, our brand is to consider other other options.”
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“Interestingly, we're hearing a lot of interest from other communities in the region, in the Southwest Minnesota region, so we'll just take a step back and think and discuss the best path forward,” Nixon added. “We continue to believe that the project can bring huge benefits to the region generally and the community."
The county board’s decision upholds a recommendation made by the county’s planning commission earlier this month that denied zoning changes to allow such projects to be built in agricultural preservation districts.
The text amendment to the county’s zoning ordinance would have allowed data centers as a light industrial use in agriculture preservation districts, said Bruce Heitkamp, Nobles County Administrator. Currently, data centers are not permitted to be placed in those areas. Heitkamp said he was neither for or against the zoning change but he did note that such projects may significantly change the county’s tax base.
“Seventy to 80 percent of Nobles County is in ag preservation district. It’s our number one industry,” Heitkamp told MPR News. “Down here, it’s 70 percent of our tax base. So, if that text amendment was approved, data centers, if approved, would be approved anywhere in those ag preservation district areas.”
Geronimo Power’s data center development would have generated an estimated $7 million annually in tax revenue for Nobles County, according to the county’s scoping documents.
But the proposal to allow data centers in the county sparked a lot of opposition amongst local residents. In contrast to other data center developers around the state that have been secretive about their plans, Geronimo Power was very upfront with the community and openly disclosed details of its plan. But that may have only bolstered the opposition.
A standing room only crowd attended Tuesday’s county board meeting, with many of the residents there opposed to the project. And about 300 residents packed the April 8 planning committee meeting at which the zoning change was discussed.
“Everybody’s concerned, and we’re concerned too,” Heitkamp said. “But we’re looking at the strengths and weaknesses [of the plan], the opportunities, the threats.”
While several other data center project developers across the state have revealed few, if any, details about their projects in advance of such votes, often having local government officials sign non-disclosure agreements prohibiting them from discussing the plans, Geronimo Power took the opposite approach. The company has hosted open houses to show details of their plans, and it has been actively promoting the project all around the county. Nonetheless, the project still drew significant opposition among county residents.
However, Nixon said he doesn’t regret being upfront about the data center project from the start.
"I never think it's a mistake to be open and transparent, and just because something doesn't work doesn't mean it was not the right thing to do,” Nixon said. “I think it is the right thing to do, and we will continue to do it, and hopefully people will, you know, appreciate that and meet us halfway and not use that against us."
Nobles County commissioners could have overridden the planning commission’s recommendation and approve the zoning change. Or it could have directed staff to develop an alternative measure that could include stricter data center regulations and limit where they could be located. Two commissioners voted for that option. But the three commissioner majority voted to uphold the county’s planning commission’s recommendation and deny the zoning change, keeping data centers out of Nobles County, for now.
Correction (April 21, 2026): A previous version of the story misstated the last name of Geronimo Power President Blake Nixon. It has been fixed.
