Denver working group on data centers says they're off to promising start, "it exceeded my expectations"

Denver's working group on data centers has officially begun meeting with the goal of creating policy recommendations for the city.

The group, diversely composed of community members and experts in a multitude of industries, was created after the city council approved a moratorium to pause the construction of data centers in Denver.

"This is an opportunity to be a part of democracy in action to help set the rules that we haven't had for these kinds of developments, and to make sure we're protecting Denver's resources and putting Denverites first," said Mark Orrs, who's on the working group.

Orrs is an associate professor at Colorado School of Mines, and he's bringing his expertise to the table.

"My training is in sustainable development, and I teach responsible engineering, specifically engineering for social and environmental responsibility," he explained. 

And one of the core questions at the center of the conversation is whether 'sustainable' and 'data centers' can exist in the same sentence.

"There are new kinds of technologies coming out every day that might make them more sustainable," Orrs said. "But to date, what we've seen is a lot of unsustainable development in this area."

Orrs is one of 26 individuals with diverse backgrounds chosen to participate from more than 250 applicants. But with honor comes enormous responsibility. 

"We know that others are looking to us, and to see how we decide to proceed, and that they will follow," said Orrs.

"We are and have been the tip of the spear on this discussion," said Councilman Darrell Watson. "We are one of the first large municipalities to do a moratorium. We're one of maybe one that are building a working group with this very extensive application process."

Watson represents District 9, where the controversial CoreSite facility in Globeville was recently built, which became the catalyst for the moratorium.  

"I think we have a unique process, and I do believe we're going to come up with a commonsense approach to regulating data centers," said Watson. 

For now, the working group is just getting started and met for the first time last week.

"I thought it went about as well as I could have expected," said Orrs. "In fact, I said it exceeded my expectations."

The next working group meeting will be on October 29, and although they are slated to meet through May, Watson says they'll continue to meet as long as necessary for the city council to create legislation.