A data center with 11 buildings totaling about 6 million square feet has been proposed northwest of Delaware City with projections of creating hundreds of jobs.
New Castle County has received a plan from property owner New Castle Campus Development LLC and developer Starwood Digital Ventures for the project on about 580 acres on two properties.
One parcel is on the north side of Governor Lea Road, north of School House Road, east of Route 1 and Route 13. The other is farther north, east of Route 1 on the south side of Hamburg Road at River Road (Route 9), north of Red Lion Creek.
Plans include a 1.2 gigawatt data center spread among five buildings on the north campus and six buildings on the south campus, according to a letter on behalf of the developer from Douglas M. Eitelman, vice president of Vandemark & Lynch, engineers, planners and surveyors, of Wilmington. Each building would be two stories.
Data centers typically house computer servers, networking equipment and other technology. More than a decade ago, plans for a data center on the STAR campus in Newark were scrapped after residents protested over noise and environmental concerns of a natural gas-fired power plant that would power it.
In the new project, electrical infrastructure will be located across from Delmarva Power & Light Co.'s Red Lion electrical substation. The electrical yards are sized to support both phases of the project, Eitelman wrote.
A traffic impact study will be conducted.
“Data centers generate significantly less trips than similarly sized warehouse/logistics uses,” Eitelman wrote.
Michael Perlman, senior vice president of Starwood Capital Group, wrote a letter to the county requesting approval of the data center under the county’s “Jobs Now” program, which offers “accelerated plan review for development projects that bring new or expanded employment opportunities.”
“Timely approvals under the Jobs Now program are essential to meeting customer demand and ensuring project viability,” Perlman wrote.
He said Starwood Digital Ventures will own the data center and will lease it to a user who will operate it.
If the plans are approved, Perlman estimates construction could start in the third quarter of 2026 with operations targeted to start in the second quarter of 2028.
Starwood Digital Ventures is a subsidiary of Starwood Capital Group, a private investment firm with a primary focus on global real estate, Perlman said.
“Founded in 1991, Starwood is one of the world’s largest private real estate firms, with more than $115 billion in assets under management. Starwood Digital Ventures currently has over $17 billion of digital infrastructure commitments and a pipeline of over 3.5 GW of data center developments globally,” Perlman wrote.
He estimated the investment in building the data center at $5 billion.
“End users will invest considerably more into the data center for hardware,” he wrote.
Perlman projected 95 to 125 permanent jobs on the data center operations team in addition to hundreds of construction and trade jobs during the building process.
Top paying jobs are a data center operations director, estimated at $125,000 to $170,000; a property management director, $120,000 to $160,000; two property managers, $95,000 to $130,000 each and two data center operations managers, $95,000 to $140,000 each.
The list of potential employees includes 24 “roving engineers” making between $55,000 and $90,000, 40 security staff making between $40,000 and $65,000 and 18 custodians making between $40,000 and $60,000.
“The ultimate number of new permanent jobs to be created as a result of the project is expected to be significantly greater…depending on the ultimate tenant and end user of the buildings,” Perlman wrote.
Kevin Caneco is the New Castle County councilman in the 12th District where the data center is planned.
“I’m open to looking at it,” Caneco said. “The location somewhat makes sense, nestled next to a refinery and other developments. However, I’m also concerned about the possible environmental impacts,” including the electricity required and the noise created.
According to computer networking and security company Cisco, “the key components of a data center design include routers, switches, firewalls, storage systems, servers and application-delivery controllers.”
“Data center components require significant infrastructure to support the center's hardware and software,” according to the Cisco website. “These include power subsystems, uninterruptible power supplies, ventilation, cooling systems, fire suppression, backup generators and connections to external networks.”
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Caneco opposes an expedited approval process.
“My position is this should go through the normal land use process, which takes 12 to 18 months,” Caneco said, providing time for a thorough review and public hearings.
The southern property is zoned for uses which include a data center, but the northern property is not. That parcel would require a county council rezoning vote.
Caneco would also like to see more specifics on the jobs that would be created.
“I’m open to having a project that could bring high-quality, high-paying jobs, but I want to know what the actual number will be,” he said. “Not knowing the tenant, we’re basically speculating. I want some assurances.”
“It’s kind of in its infancy stages now,” Caneco said. “It’s very early. We have a lot to learn.”
Reporter Ben Mace covers real estate, development and business news. Reach him at [email protected].