A data center is a dedicated building housing information technology equipment such as computer servers, network systems and storage. Data centers power digital applications and services. They range from single rooms in office buildings to large commercial complexes.
Data centers provide the physical infrastructure supporting the digital services used daily by individuals, businesses and public agencies. This network underpins personal activities — such as online banking, telehealth and streaming media — alongside large-scale corporate and government operations. This includes artificial intelligence (AI), which requires enormous computing power and large-scale data centers.
In Northern Virginia, home to more than 376,000 technology workers, this infrastructure serves as a foundation for local startups, tech firms and government contractors, among others.
As of August 2026, 20 standalone data centers are operating in Fairfax County, with 11 more under construction. These are full, independent facilities, not smaller data centers located inside other types of buildings.
Fairfax County's Role
- Implement the Zoning Ordinance permissions and standards, adopted in September 2024, to say where data centers are allowed and how big they can be.
- Require noise studies, visual screening and certain building design standards to make sure data centers fit in with nearby neighborhoods.
- Set minimum distances between data centers and homes or Metro stations.
- Depending on the size and location of a data center, public hearings may be required. Public hearings provide opportunity for community input.
- Approve or deny electrical substations through its 2232 Public Facilities Review process. These are ultimately decided by the Planning Commission and require public hearings. In addition, except in certain industrial districts, electrical substations require special exception approval by the Board of Supervisors, which requires public hearings by the Planning Commission and the Board of Supervisors.
- Provide land use and environmental guidance within the Comprehensive Plan for data centers that require rezoning or special exception applications.
Virginia's Role
- State Corporation Commission controls things related to energy, including approving electricity rates proposed by utility companies, electricity demand, and transmission lines for data centers. Fairfax County does not have authority over these.
- Virginia Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) regulates air pollution from data centers. Data centers must meet standards, including using cleaner generators.
- DEQ also handles permits for cooling water discharges if water goes into the stormwater system and sets pollution limits.
- New laws require additional information for large data centers (high‑energy use facilities – those using 100 MW or more) undergoing a rezoning or special exception process. The requirements include additional information about noise impacts, electrical substations and transmission voltage.
How the County Regulates Data Centers
In September 2024, the Board of Supervisors established rules that control where data centers can be built and how they are designed. Before adopting this Zoning Ordinance amendment, the Board directed staff to study environmental impacts, energy and water demand, air and water quality, noise, building design, and site location, and staff held more than 20 stakeholder meetings along with a community input session on the research report.
Additional community engagement and public hearings took place as part of the development and adoption of the Zoning Ordinance and Comprehensive Plan amendments, all of which helped shape the final regulations and guidelines. In December 2025, the Board of Supervisors adopted additional standards for electrical substations.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do residents pay the cost of increased energy demand by data centers?
County residents do not directly pay for the electricity data centers use; however, they may pay a portion of the cost of improvements to energy infrastructure, such as new power lines and equipment, required to support increased energy demands. Utility companies incur costs to build, operate, and maintain the energy grid and provide power to customers, including high energy users like data centers. Rates, or fees, are determined by usage and customer class designation. Companies recover those costs through rates charged to customers. The Virginia State Corporation Commission (SCC) reviews and approves utility rates every two years to ensure that rates remain reasonable.
Recent legislation will require high-energy users like data centers to be responsible for required grid improvements for their projects. For instance
- Virginia Senate Bill 253 requires data centers pay for their own power equipment instead of sharing that cost with regular families.
- The State Corporation Commission (SCC) ordered Dominion Energy to cover the cost of transmission infrastructure built exclusively to serve data centers.
Are data centers the reason the cost of electricity is increasing?
Data centers are not the sole reason for increased electricity costs. The Virginia General Assembly’s Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission (JLARC) issued a report after conducting a study on the impacts of the data center industry in Virginia. The state’s study concluded that current rates appropriately allocate costs to the customers responsible for incurring them, including data centers.
Electricity prices are influenced by multiple factors, including ongoing capital investments to replace or upgrade aging generation, transmission and distribution infrastructure. These grid modernization efforts support both existing customers and new large customers, such as data centers.
How much water do data centers use in Northern Virginia?
According to the Interstate Commission on the Potomac River Basin across all of Northern Virginia, data centers use less than 100,000 gallons of water daily in the Potomac River basin. Data centers’ consumptive use is less than 0.1 percent of the total 100 million gallons of upstream consumptive water use in the region. Approximately 40 percent of regional data centers rely on air cooling instead of water-based cooling. Learn more: Data Centers and Water Use in the Potomac River Basin
It is hard to know the exact amount of water used in Fairfax County because water use has been kept private. However, Virginia Senate Bill 552 (SB553) was signed into law on April 13, 2026, requiring water companies to report the total amount of water used by the data center industry, which was not required before. More detailed information will be available after the legislation goes into effect on Jan. 1, 2027.
How much do data centers contribute in taxes to Fairfax County’s General Fund?
Data centers contributed approximately $110.6 million in tax year 2026 to the county's General Fund. This is approximately 1.9 percent of the total FY 2027 General Fund revenue.
This contribution comes from two primary sources:
- Real Estate Taxes: $29.9 million (based on tax year 2026 total assessed land and building value of approximately $2.67 billion).
- Business Personal Property Taxes: $80.7 million for tax year 2026.
- The $110.6 million in data center revenue is the equivalent of three pennies on the county’s FY 2027 real estate tax rate of $1.12 per $100 of assessed value or approximately $260 on the average FY 2027 homeowner’s real estate tax bill.
- A majority of the data center revenue comes from business personal property taxes on data center equipment, which is subject to the county’s computer equipment depreciation schedule in subsequent years.
Does living near a data center hurt home values?
Fairfax County has not analyzed home values near data centers. Various entities have conducted independent research to assess the economic impacts of these facilities. George Mason University’s Center for Regional Analysis conducted a study on this topic in 2023. The study concluded that after accounting for all industrial properties, there is no marginal negative effect of being closer to a data center. The National Association of Realtors conducted a study in 2026 finding no statistical evidence that data centers automatically lower nearby home values.
What opportunities exist for public input on data center developments in Fairfax County?
A data center can be built “by right” without a public hearing only in the I-5 and I-6 zoned districts, which are the heaviest industrial districts, if it meets all required standards. Changes to certain standards, such as allowing a data center to be closer to residential or Metro, requires special exception approval, which must go through public hearings before both the Planning Commission and the Board of Supervisors. In the other commercial and industrial districts where data centers are allowed, size limits ensure that any large data center will require public hearings and special exception approval. During these hearings, community members can testify in person, by telephone or pre-recorded video. Written testimony may also be submitted in advance.