NASHVILLE, Tenn. (Nashville Banner) — This story was originally published by the Nashville Banner. Sign up for their newsletter.
The company whose planned data center next to the Nashville Zoo provoked massive public backlash is suing Metro over the city’s “relentless efforts” to block the development.
The lawsuit, filed by attorneys for DC Blox on Tuesday in federal court in Nashville, argues that the city acted illegally by implementing zoning changes and a moratorium on new data centers after the company secured the necessary permits for the site. Mayor Freddie O’Connell has also initiated an effort to take ownership of the 23-plus-acre property, with the backing of the Metro Council.
The fight in Nashville is just one of many over data center construction across the country, where residents near the planned sites have objected to the technology the facilities support — like artificial intelligence — and to the effects of the centers themselves. Depending on the size of the center, it can use immense amounts of energy, along with water for cooling, and emit a humming noise said to be audible up to a mile away. Elon Musk’s enormous “Colossus” xAI data center in Memphis has been tied to surging pollution in the area.
There are at least two dozen data centers already operating in Middle Tennessee, including a 900-acre site in Gallatin owned by Facebook’s parent company, Meta. The proposed facilities at the center of the debate in Nashville are far smaller but have nevertheless caused a storm. Fisk University’s plan to build a data center on its North Nashville campus, announced in May, attracted some opposition. But the pushback was supercharged by the news of DC Blox’s plans. Calls from the zoo to stop the project went viral, and a petition to that effect has now been signed by more than half a million people.
The lawsuit from DC Blox cites public comments by O’Connell and Metro Councilmember Courtney Johnston as evidence that Metro acted to prevent its project specifically, rather than data centers in general.
“The Data Center Moratorium, moreover, is a targeted attack against DC BLOX, in violation of federal constitutional protections,” the complaint reads. “Despite the prohibitive language against all data centers, Council specifically and intentionally targeted Plaintiff’s vested project and used ‘every tool’ and ‘every avenue’ it could to deny or delay the project.”
The complaint also highlights Asurion’s previous use of the property for office space and a data center.
DC Blox is asking the court to block the city from enforcing the new data center ordinances, declare them unlawful and order Metro to pay the company financial damages.
This article first appeared on Nashville Banner and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
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