Developer Proposes 1.4M SF Data Center Campus On Former GM Testing Site In Arizona
A massive data center campus is planned on what was once General Motors’ sprawling proving ground in Mesa, Arizona.
Pacific Proving LLC has filed plans for a 178-acre campus capable of supporting 360 megawatts of data center capacity, potentially one of the largest such facilities in the region, The Mesa Tribune reported Monday. No end user has been named for the project, which is the latest in a flood of development that has made Mesa a Big Tech data center boomtown.
At full build-out, the proposed campus on Pecos Road would consist of six data centers totaling 1.4M SF. The site is on what was once part of the GM Desert Proving Grounds, where the auto giant tested vehicle systems from 1953 to 2009.
Pacific Proving, backed by Phoenix developer William Levine, acquired 1,800 acres of the GM testing range for $45M in 2004. Other sections of Pacific Proving's parcel just West of the proposed data center campus have already been developed as an industrial park.
Amazon is also building a data center on Pecos Road, a 71-acre project just east of Pacific Proving’s proposed campus. It is one of a pair of data centers the tech giant plans to build in Mesa, the company announced in September.
Mesa remains a primary hub within the rapidly ascending Phoenix data center market. Major tech companies and third-party data center providers have continued to propose big projects in the city, drawn by the availability of developable land and hundreds of megawatts of power.
In September, Google announced the start of construction on the first phase of its $600M, 167-acre data center campus in the city, a project that received approval in 2019. Third-party providers Novva Data Centers and EdgeConneX also unveiled plans for campuses in Mesa this fall, with EdgeCore Digital Infrastructure and Edged Energy advancing projects since the start of the year.
There are more than 15 new data center projects looking to enter the development pipeline in Mesa, The Mesa Tribune reported, citing the number of power studies requested from the local utility.
But as Bisnow has reported, this steady stream of data center projects has begun generating pushback from politicians and community groups.
“We are blessed that we’ve been so attractive to data centers for the last several years, but I think … we’re more interested now in advanced manufacturing,” Mesa Mayor John Giles said, according to The Mesa Tribune.
