“Closed Loop” Poisoning Water - How To Fight Back
During Compass Datacenter's ill-planned poster project on July 28th, their sales team argued that their "closed-loop" cooling technology wouldn't pollute the water.
A community in Michigan is finding out all those big promises were just big lies. A public notice states that it “authorizes an increased loading of pollutants to the Saline River” and that it “will lower the water quality with respect to certain parameters. Check out the full post here.. The notice says the reduction in water quality is considered necessary to support important social and economic development in the area.
Let’s clarify: they’re increasing the allowable amounts of poison into the water for that big data center money up in Michigan to accommodate closed loop cooling systems like the one proposed by Compass Datacenters in Shawnee County.
The proposed hyperscale datacenter near Montara Village south of Topeka would sit directly within the sensitive Upper Wakarusa Watershed, which feeds directly into Clinton Lake —a primary source of public recreation, wildlife habitat, and drinking water for over 100,000 Kansans.
During Compass Datacenters’ poorly catered event, one Compass salesperson told a local industrial hygienist that because local zoning rules lack specialized data center oversight, the company could just discharge chemical-laden wastewater directly into nearby creeks and county waterways without constraint.
This flagrant disregard for the local ecosystem poses a catastrophic risk to public welfare and represents an explicit failure to meet the Golden v. City of Overland Park factor
Check out this awesome map of Kansas and zoom in to your community to check out flooding. Interested in learning more about mapping data center water use? Check out Dr. Cynthia Annett’s website here.
Location of Proposed Compass Hyperscale Data Center in Shawnee County – Outlined in Black
The Wakarusa Watershed drains directly to Clinton Lake which provides drinking water for over 100,000 people.
Call to Action:
We need all Shawnee County Residents to contact the Shawnee County Planning Commission to object to the data center Conditional Use Permit application submitted by Compass Datacenters.
We recommend adding information about the personal impact to the community and providing additional examples of how this is bad for the community.
Data Center Development page: https://www.snco.gov/ludev/data_center.php
Email: LUDev@snco.gov
Date: [Insert Date]
To:
Shawnee County Planning Commission
c/o Shawnee County Planning Department
1515 NW Saline St #102, Topeka, KS 66618
Regarding: Urgent Supplement to Public Comment Against Conditional Use Permit (CUP) Application – Proposed Compass Datacenters Facility (SW 85th Street, Wakarusa Area)
To the Members of the Shawnee County Planning Commission,
I am writing to add a critical environmental objection to the record regarding the Conditional Use Permit (CUP) application submitted by Compass Datacenters for the site at SW 85th Street. This proposed industrial development sits directly within the sensitive Upper Wakarusa Watershed, which feeds directly into Clinton Lake—a primary source of public recreation, wildlife habitat, and drinking water for over 100,000 Kansans.
Alarmingly, a representative from Compass Datacenters recently communicated to an industrial hygienist during the July 28 open house that because local zoning rules lack specialized data center oversight, the company can discharge chemical-laden wastewater directly into nearby creeks – including the one it would be built on - and county waterways due to lack of . This flagrant disregard for the local ecosystem poses a catastrophic risk to public welfare and represents an explicit failure to meet the Golden v. City of Overland Park factors.
Under the Golden framework, the Planning Commission must evaluate this application against three critical benchmarks:
Relative Gain to Public Health, Safety, and Welfare vs. Hardship: Granting this permit creates massive public detriment. Data center cooling systems - including those that use closed loop cooling systems - regularly utilize anti-scaling chemicals, biocides, and corrosion inhibitors. Discharging this unmitigated industrial blowdown water into the Wakarusa watershed risks triggering toxic algal blooms, introducing heavy metals, and permanently degrading the water quality of Clinton Lake. The health of our regional water supply must outweigh corporate utility.
Suitability of the Subject Property: An industrial operation requiring mass wastewater disposal is inherently unsuited for a rural, ecologically connected site like SW 85th Street. The property completely lacks the dedicated industrial sewer infrastructure needed to safely treat and isolate toxic data center discharge.
Detrimental Impact on Nearby Properties: Neighboring agricultural lands, livestock water sources, and residential properties rely heavily on the local water table. Unregulated dumping into local creeks will poison shared waterways, threaten agricultural livelihoods, and decimate neighboring property values.
Compass Datacenters' admission that they can simply exploit a lack of local regulations to dump industrial wastewater is a disqualifying threat to Shawnee County. The county must protect its natural resources from predatory development. I urge the Planning Commission to formally recommend a denial of this Conditional Use Permit.
Sincerely,
Signature: ____________________________
Printed Name: [Your Name]
Address: [Your Address, Topeka/Shawnee County, KS]
Email/Phone: [Your Contact Information]