Under the weight of increasing pressure from local residents and environmental activists, Kevin O’Leary has decided to significantly reduce the scale of his ambitious data center project in Utah. Originally planned to span a sprawling 40,000 acres, the Shark Tank personality has announced a reduction to roughly half that size. In a letter addressed to Utah Senate President J. Stuart Adams, O’Leary confirmed the removal of 19,430 acres from the proposed site, which is situated in and around the Locomotive Springs Waterfowl Management Area, as reported by local news affiliate ABC4.
This decision follows closely on the heels of a public appeal from Adams, who urged O’Leary to cut the size of his Project Stratos data center by 75 percent, effectively bringing it down to approximately 10,000 acres. Alongside the request for downsizing, Adams called for the adoption of water-saving technologies and the redirection of surplus water to the dwindling Great Salt Lake, underscoring environmental concerns tied to the project.
In his correspondence, O’Leary also mentioned plans to eliminate an additional 620 acres from the project’s northeast section near a highway, committing to maintain most of the remaining land as open space. Despite the reduction, the project will still occupy about 20,000 acres, an area larger than Manhattan. This has sparked ongoing debates about the environmental implications, including the potential for substantial energy consumption and pollution, even from data centers of much smaller dimensions.
