The data center fight in Culpeper County, Virginia
As of September 27, 2026, Culpeper County, Virginia has a data center moratorium in force (action taken Sep 2, 2025).
Status is derived, not stored — a pause with a documented end date flips to Expired on its own — and the source is right next to the claim.
Status today
Unanimous zoning text amendment requiring a conditional use permit — planning commission review, public hearing and a board vote — for data centers on light and heavy industrial land (about 2,200 acres on 140 LI parcels plus 867 acres HI). Data centers inside the Culpeper Technology Zone stay by-right. The permit route has not meant denial: on Jul 2, 2026 the board rezoned 69.19 acres of farmland at Nalles Mill and Keyser roads 4-3 for Red Ace Capital's two-building, 1.16M sq ft campus, after tabling it in June. The county counts two operating data centers and expects seven campuses in the Tech Zone plus an approved Amazon campus
SourceNews
read 2026-09-05
An expiry date is the earliest a pause could have ended — extensions are common, so confirm with the clerk before citing it.
The project on the table
Red Ace data center campus (Keyser Road) — Approved
Operator: Red Ace Capital Management · Owner: Red Ace Capital Management · Acres: 69
69.19 acres of farmland at Nalles Mill and Keyser roads rezoned Rural to Light Industrial 4-3 on Jul 2, 2026 after being tabled in June: two four-story, 290,000 sq ft buildings (1.16M sq ft total) plus a substation, about $350M, completion not before 2028. Approved under the county's Sep 2025 rule that industrial-land data centers need a conditional use permit.
Next: Approved — pivot from stopping it to a binding CBA: enforceable caps on noise, water and cost, plus a community benefit.
Latest in the record
- 2026-07-02 — Board of Supervisors approved the rezoning 4-3 (Deal, Durr, Gugino, Underwood for; Bates, Lee, Rosenberger against) for 69.19 acres from Rural to Light Industrial for a two-building, 1.16M sq ft campus with an electrical substation. · source
- 2026-06-01 — In June the Board of Supervisors tabled the Red Ace rezoning. · source
Full dated timeline on the project tracker.
Source. Read 2026-09-05.
Where the decision gets made
Board of Supervisors — Rezonings and the conditional use permits required for data centers on industrial land since Sep 2, 2025 (the Technology Zone stays by-right). Approved the Red Ace campus rezoning 4-3 on Jul 2, 2026.
Meets: Regular meetings on the first Tuesday; see the board calendar (e.g. Oct 6, 2026 at 10 a.m. and 7 p.m.).
Where: 302 North Main Street, Culpeper, VA 22701
Public comment: Email all members at BOS@culpepercounty.gov; agendas and minutes are on BoardDocs. See the published agenda for the public-comment process for a specific meeting.
BOS@culpepercounty.gov · 540-727-3427 · website
Read from the official page on 2026-09-05. Meeting details change — confirm before you go.
Who votes on it
| Name | Role | Phone | Recorded stance | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tom Underwood | Chairman | TUNDERWOOD@CULPEPERCOUNTY.GOV | (540) 717-5263 | Voted yes on the Red Ace rezoning, Jul 2, 2026 (Data Center Dynamics) |
| Gary M. Deal | Vice Chairman | GDEAL@CULPEPERCOUNTY.GOV | (540) 219-8835 | Voted yes on the Red Ace rezoning, Jul 2, 2026; said 'a lot of fabrications' fuel data center outrage (WJLA, Jul 2026) |
| Paul W. Bates | Supervisor | PWBATES@CULPEPERCOUNTY.GOV | (540) 827-9072 | Voted no on the Red Ace rezoning, Jul 2, 2026 (Data Center Dynamics) |
| David C. Lee | Supervisor | DLEE@CULPEPERCOUNTY.GOV | (540) 718-9432 | Voted no on the Red Ace rezoning, Jul 2, 2026 (Data Center Dynamics) |
| Mandy Brown | Supervisor | MBROWN@CULPEPERCOUNTY.GOV | (540) 718-2459 | not recorded |
| DeWayne Payne | Supervisor | DPAYNE@CULPEPERCOUNTY.GOV | (540) 764-2195 | not recorded |
| Keith Farrish | Supervisor | KFARRISH@CULPEPERCOUNTY.GOV | (703) 887-8041 | not recorded |
From the locality's own roster page; "not recorded" means no public statement is on file, not neutrality.
What to do next
- Questions to ask at the hearing — force specific answers onto the record.
- Estimate the impact — electricity, water, and rate pressure for any facility size in Virginia.
- Model CBA clauses — copy-paste language communities have actually won.
- Virginia briefing — rates, grid carbon, PUC contacts, and every fight in the state.
Nearby in Virginia
- Spotsylvania County (26 mi) — Enactedno end date — permanent
- Stafford County (32 mi) — Enactedno end date — permanent
- Front Royal (33 mi) — Enactedexpires soon — 2026-10-04
- Fairfax County (45 mi) — Enactedno end date — permanent
- Loudoun County (46 mi) — Proposedterm not documented
- Fluvanna County (46 mi) — Expiredterm ran to 2026-01-31
- Virginia (Dominion GS-5 large-load rate class) (71 mi) — Enactedno end date — permanent
- Virginia (statewide pause request) (71 mi) — Rejectedterm not documented
All 14 tracked actions in Virginia are on the state page.
As of August 2026 · changes weekly — re-check before citing
Illustrative rather than exhaustive — dozens of localities churn weekly, and this tracks the ones we have read a source for. **Each row carries its own provenance.** Rows showing a verification date link to the ordinance, the enacting body's own page, or a datable report of the vote, and were read on that date. Rows marked *unverified* came from bulk compilation and have not been checked against a primary source — the locality, the year, and the status may all be off. Verify one of those with the town clerk before citing it as precedent. **Expiry is derived, not asserted.** A row with a documented end date flips to *Expired* on its own once that date passes. A time-limited moratorium whose start date was never documented keeps showing as enacted — that is a known gap, not a claim that it is still in force. Moratoriums are also routinely extended, so an expiry date is the earliest it could have ended, not proof that it did.
Part of the U.S. data center moratorium tracker — open data, CC BY 4.0.