Data Center Projects in Arizona and Georgia Cited for Unauthorized Construction Water Use

Two data center developments, one in Arizona and another in Georgia, were caught taking public water without authorization in the first week of May 2026. In both cases, residents' complaints triggered investigations in communities already facing water stress. The episodes form part of a broader pattern of conflict over data center water use nationwide.

Residents in Fayette County, Georgia, complained of low water pressure throughout 2025 in the Annelise Park subdivision, located about 20 miles south of Atlanta. The Fayette County utility traced the issue to two industrial-scale water hookups feeding a 615-acre data center campus codenamed Project Excalibur, developed by Quality Technology Services, or QTS, which is owned by Blackstone.

One connection had been installed without the utility’s knowledge, while the other existed but was not linked to QTS’s billing account.

By the time the problem was identified, QTS had consumed more than 29 million gallons of water in Fayette County. That volume equals 44 Olympic-sized swimming pools and far exceeded the peak usage limit agreed to during Project Excalibur’s planning process. 2 million square feet and is projected to generate $150 to $200 million annually in property tax revenue for the city.

The Fayette County water system sent QTS a letter in May 2025 documenting retroactive charges of $147,474. QTS paid the $147,474 in retroactive charges, and no additional fines were imposed on QTS by Fayette County. Vanessa Tigert said the company is the county’s largest customer and that the relationship requires partnership.

QTS stated that the high water usage was tied to temporary construction activities of concrete, dust suppression, and site preparation. The company says it will use a closed-loop cooling system that will not consume water for cooling once operational. Construction on the QTS campus is expected to continue for another three to five years.

Local attorney James Clifton obtained the utility’s 2025 letter to QTS through a public records request and posted it on Facebook. In Iowa, state officials discovered 40 unpermitted wells at QTS’s data center site in Cedar Rapids in 2025. Linn County sought a $20,000 fine against QTS for the 40 unpermitted wells in Cedar Rapids.

In Tucson, Arizona, residents complained about dust control efforts at the Project Blue data center complex. Last week, City Manager Timothy Thomure sent a letter to Beale Infrastructure stating that contractor Ames Construction had obtained a construction water meter within Tucson’s service area and transported the water outside city limits without authorization.

The city shut off the meter immediately after discovering the unauthorized use.

Timothy Thomure demanded that Beale replace the two acre-feet of water used, which is approximately 650,000 gallons. That amount is roughly equal to the annual water usage of six to seven American households. In August 2025, the Tucson City Council unanimously rejected any involvement with the Project Blue data center complex, originally linked to Amazon.

Amazon withdrew from the Project Blue data center project less than a year after the August 2025 council vote. Beale Infrastructure purchased the land for Project Blue from Pima County and continued construction while seeking new partners. A resident asked a city staffer whether the dust control water at the Project Blue site was coming from the city, triggering an investigation.

Beale said the city had issued a permit for temporary water through normal channels. City spokesman Andy Squire said the document was not a permit but an application for a construction meter intended for use within Tucson Water’s service area. Andy Squire said the contractor didn’t disclose that the water would be transported outside city limits.

Developers site large projects just beyond municipal boundaries in Arizona to avoid the state’s Assured and Adequate Water Supply law, which requires a demonstration that a development can meet its water needs for 100 years. The Tucson region averages seven to 10 inches of rain per year.

Earlier this month, the lower Colorado River basin states of Arizona, Nevada, and California signed a new conservation agreement aimed at saving a million acre-feet of water from a river system that was first divided among the states in 1922.

The Phoenix metropolitan area had a population of roughly 30,000 in 1922. 5 million gallons a day in South Carolina.

A data center proposal tied to Kevin O’Leary drew nearly 3,900 public protests in Utah. More than 50 cities across the country have enacted bans or moratoria on new data center construction. Fayetteville, Georgia, enacted a ban or moratorium on new data center construction.

A Meta data center in Newton County, Georgia, disrupted nearby private wells. U.S. 4 billion gallons of water in 2023. U.S.

On average, a medium-sized data center consumes roughly 110 million gallons of water per year for cooling, enough to supply the annual water use of about 1,000 households. Larger data center facilities can consume up to 5 million gallons a day. Google’s data centers in The Dalles, Oregon, consumed 355 million gallons in 2021.

The Dalles, Oregon, had a population of 16,000. Google’s data centers in The Dalles consumed roughly a quarter of the city’s total water supply in 2021. A Houston Advanced Research Center study estimated Texas data centers would use 49 billion gallons in 2025 and as much as 399 billion gallons by 2030.

1 billion gallons across all its data centers globally in 2024.