Project dossier · Dickerson (Montgomery County), Maryland

Dickerson Data Center Campus (Atmosphere) Awaiting decision

Atmosphere Data Centers (which took over the project from Terra Innovations, whose initial conditional-use application dates to January 2024) proposes a five-building data center campus on 110 acres at the decommissioned Dickerson Generating Station coal plant site; a major modification to the conditional use was filed in December 2025 and amended plans are on Montgomery Planning's development database. On 2026-07-28 the Montgomery County Council approved an 18-month moratorium on new data center approvals that encompasses this proposal; Office of Zoning and Administrative Appeals hearings had been scheduled for Sept 10-11, 2026.

Key facts

Operator: Atmosphere Data Centers
Size: 110 ac
Location: Dickerson (Montgomery County), Maryland
Hearing: 2026-09-10
Stage today: Awaiting decision

Source
read 2026-08-14

What to do next

Next step: Heard 2026-09-10; decision pending. Call the board clerk for the vote date and get on the notification list.

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What has happened so far (12 events)

2025-12-04ruling
As reported December 4, 2025, the county hearing examiner had granted Terra Energy conditional use approval (case CU 24-13) for a data center complex at the Dickerson site, with the number and square footage of buildings left to future modifications. · source
2026-02-03protest
A community forum on data centers was held in Rockville amid the debate over the Dickerson proposal, around the time County Executive Elrich first raised the possibility of a moratorium. · source
2026-02-24hearing
At a County Council hearing on data centers, approximately 30 speakers testified and 218 written testimonies were submitted; Atmosphere's proposal is described as a 300-megawatt campus on 110 acres seeking a Potomac River withdrawal cap of 500,000 gallons per day. · source
2026-05-26filing
The Final Statement of Case and Operations in case CU 24-13(a)(A) for the Atmosphere Dickerson data center amendment is dated May 26, 2026, per the OZAH case record. · source
2026-06-12announcement
Atmosphere CEO Chuck McBride issued a statement saying the company respects the county's desire to take time to evaluate data center policies and appreciates the opportunity for public discussion. · source
2026-06-13moratorium
County Executive Marc Elrich announced a six-month moratorium on data center permits by executive order at a Friday afternoon news conference, saying it creates time to establish clear rules before applications move through permitting. · source
2026-07-16lawsuit
County Executive Marc Elrich, at his weekly media briefing, acknowledged that Atmosphere Data Centers had filed an appeal of his data center moratorium with the county's Office of Zoning and Administrative Hearings. · source
2026-07-28vote
Montgomery County Council approved an 18-month moratorium halting new data center approvals and applications, encompassing the Atmosphere proposal for a 110-acre, 5-building campus in Dickerson. · source
2026-07-28coverage
After the Council passed the 18-month moratorium, Atmosphere CEO Chuck McBride said the company was disappointed and would take time to fully evaluate the Council's action. · source
2026-07-30hearing
County Planning Board review of the project scheduled for July 30, 2026. · source
2026-09-10hearing
Office of Zoning and Administrative Appeals hearings on the conditional-use modification scheduled for Sept 10-11, 2026. · source
2026-11-12hearing
The Office of Zoning and Administrative Hearings lists the hearing on case CU 24-13(a)(A) (Atmosphere Dickerson Property Owner, LLC; conditional use holder Terra Energy, LLC) as scheduled for Thursday and Friday, November 12 and 13, 2026, at 9:30 a.m. · source

Find the paper trail

Find the paper trail (0 filed · 11 places to look)

State environmental permits

Backup generators, water withdrawal and stormwater are permitted by the state, usually earlier and in more detail than anything filed locally.

Maryland Dept. of the EnvironmentThe program page: which permits this state requires, and the office that issues them.
Search Maryland Dept. of the Environment for this projectsearchThis state publishes no searchable permit database, so a written records request to the agency is the reliable route. Use this search only to find the right office.

County & town filings

The rezoning application, site plan, traffic and noise studies, staff report and every revision.

Search Dickerson (Montgomery County) planning filingssearchPlanning departments post application files under many different names. Find the department, then ask the clerk for the application number — that number unlocks everything else.
Search Dickerson (Montgomery County) property records / GISsearchThe parcel record names the buying LLC and the sale date, which is what ties an anonymous filing to an operator.

Utility & grid records

The electricity request is filed with the grid operator and the utility long before the town hears about it — and states the real load.

PJM Interconnection (Mid-Atlantic, Ohio Valley) — interconnection queueRequested megawatts, queue position and target in-service date. The MW here is the real number; the one at the town meeting is often phase one.
Maryland Public Service Commission — docket searchSpecial contracts, large-load tariffs and rate cases are docketed here. Testimony and exhibits are public, and are usually more candid than the press release.
FERC eLibraryFederal filings: transmission agreements, interconnection service agreements, and co-location disputes.
Search the serving utility for a will-serve lettersearchThe will-serve or load-service letter is the utility's own written commitment. Ask the utility and the PUC for it by name — it is frequently the first document to exist.

Federal databases

Works anywhere, and covers the operator's record at its other sites.

EPA ECHO facility searchEvery federally-reported air, water and waste permit at a facility, plus its inspection and violation history. Search by address or draw a radius around the site. This project's locality centres on 39.260, -77.420 — search that point with a 5-mile radius.
EPA EnvirofactsThe same underlying records, queryable by county — useful for 'what else is permitted near this site' rather than one facility.
EPA Facility Registry ServiceResolves the shell LLC on a permit to the facility it belongs to. Worth a look when the filing name means nothing locally.

These are places to look, not evidence that anything has been filed. Links were checked on 2026-08-21; search links are queries, not records. What to ask for.

Around here

Montgomery County community briefing — Enactedexpires 2028-01-28
Maryland briefing — rates, grid carbon, PUC contacts.

Other tracked projects in Maryland

AWS Calvert Technology Center — Lusby (Calvert County), 78 mi Withdrawn

Cite this page: GridWatch AI, “Dickerson Data Center Campus (Atmosphere)”, aigridwatch.com/projects/dickerson-atmosphere-montgomery-md, retrieved 2026-10-11.

As of August 2026 (2m ago) · changes weekly — re-check before citing

A working set of identified proposals a community can track, not a census — most of the country's activity is not in here yet. Pennsylvania is the exception: its rows are synced from PA DEP's own data-center permit tracker, so the state's coverage is close to complete and carries the permit trail with it. **Each row carries its own provenance.** Rows showing a verification date link to reporting or the governing body's own record and were read on that date; rows marked *unverified* have no source on record — a lead to check, not a fact to cite. **Stage is derived, not asserted.** *Hearing scheduled*, *Awaiting decision*, *Approved* and *Withdrawn* are computed from each row's milestone dates on every rebuild, so a hearing date that has passed stops reading 'scheduled'. Hearings get moved and projects re-file under new names — treat a scheduled date as the earliest to act by, and confirm with the clerk before relying on it. Leads are mined into data/project_candidates.json and promoted here only after a human reads a primary source.

Part of the data center project tracker — open data, CC BY 4.0 (JSON · CSV).