VILLAGE OF CALEDONIA, Wis. — Microsoft has decided not to move forward with its proposed site for a data center in the Village of Caledonia after facing significant community pushback from residents.

PREVIOUS COVERAGE | Microsoft data center proposal continues to divide Caledonia residents as rezoning plans move forward

“Based on the community feedback we heard, we have chosen not to move forward with this site,” a Microsoft spokesperson said in a statement Wednesday.

The tech giant’s decision comes after hundreds of residents voiced opposition to the project over recent weeks. More than 2,000 people signed a petition opposing a rezoning proposal that would have allowed the data center to be built on 244 acres of land.

Watch: Microsoft pulls plug on plans for 244-acre data center in Caledonia after community pushback

The proposed site was situated on County Line Road and State Highway 32, southwest of the WE Energies Oak Creek Power Plant, and was surrounded by farmland and residential properties.

47032805-Concept Site Plan - Project Nova by TMJ4 News

Despite abandoning this particular location, Microsoft indicated it remains interested in investing in Southeast Wisconsin.

The spokesperson said the company looks forward to “working with the Village of Caledonia and Racine County leaders to identify a site that aligns with community priorities and our long-term development goals.”

TMJ4’s Jenna Rae, who has been following this story, reached out to Todd Willis, the village administrator, who provided the following statement:

    “Nothing official has been submitted to the Village regarding their pending application, and have no comment until such time.”

Resident Prescott Balch told TMJ4 that his phone did not stop ringing on Wednesday morning, as people delivered the news. PRESCOTT BALCH TMJ4 Prescott Balch lives in Caledonia. Balch welcomed the news that Microsoft is changing plans to bring a data center in the area.

"We're ecstatic that those arguments held water and ultimately convinced a large corporation to back off, so great day here in Caledonia," Balch said.

Village trustee Nancy Pierce says she learned about the change from a news article.

"I have a lot of respect for Microsoft, making the decision when they say they listened to the constituents. They also listened to board questions both at the planning commission at the board level. I believe that they took a lot of different pieces of information into play," Pierce stated. Nancy Pierce TMJ4 News Nancy Pierce is a village trustee in Caledonia.

Both Pierce and Balch made it clear that they are not opposed to working with Microsoft in Caledonia.

As the tech giant looks for a new site, there is hope that there are improvements to the overall process.

"I would’ve liked to been able to engage directly with Microsoft much earlier in the process. We were not allowed to do that. I think that became an obstacle for a lot of different points and reasons," Pierce explained. "I feel like now they would come forward much quicker and engage directly with the community, really get to understand the community."

"There are people that have an opinion about what they want to do with their village, and that was absent in this to me. That's the real message of this thing," Balch explained. "Let's help Microsoft find the right spot in southeast Wisconsin."

The whole project was several million in expenses before even making a dollar. We aren't huge either, the permitting was not supposed to take that long it but a real strain on the business.

So yeah, you're correct. The current process favors large firms, at least those large enough to absorb the cost for multiple years or however long permitting takes, which in some municipalities can be a very, very long time.

But a seller would probably prefer to sell without contingency, so what terms are available depends on market conditions.

Title insurance for residential real estate may sometimes cover properties that are unbuildable due to unsatisfiable permit requirements.

All told, it's easier as a buyer if you purchase an existing structure that was built under permits and is currently in use under appropriate occupancy permits.

Neither small or large businesses really have any big advantages here. Got to win over the community. If anything, the small business may be local and the operators more readily able to convince the community for a variance than some corporate lawyer.

The average data centre is 10,000 square metres (2.5 acres).

As well as compute and network facilities, DCs also need to accommodate parking, personnel areas, cooling, fire-suppression, power substations, power redundancy (generators), ground-security…

244 acres is absolutely at the upper end of any DC site.

So that is the mental model you should have for “how big is us-east-1”. But also, the data centers are not going to be, individually, anything like 244 acres. Best guess is that individual data centers are between 200,000 and 400,000 square feet. That is 5 to 10 acres.

Do the math above and us-east-1 may be 300 acres of floor space spread over a very large area.

I live beneath two transmission lines (overlapping, I guess, but not intersecting) and would prefer no data centre built here. Why? Because it will provide me no benefit whatsoever, reduce my property value, and worsen my quality of life due to things like light pollution and noise.

If data centre operators would fix these things perhaps people would feel differently. For example - provide multi gigabit fibre Internet to everyone nearby.

Sending kilobytes of text over thousands of miles is a lot easier than piping energy or housing across distance!

Nothing is "infinite"

Did us white europeans and white WASP american have it good, yes. Why do you hate us so, out with it.

Cant tell if woke socialist, racist or both.