Project dossier · De Soto (Johnson County), Kansas

Astra data center campus (Digital Realty) In review

Digital Realty bought ~1,435 acres in the Astra Enterprise Park (the former Sunflower Army Ammunition Plant) to develop a ~600 MW campus across Astra North and South; first phase ~$4B excluding equipment, customer undisclosed. The second major data center proposed near the $4B Panasonic battery plant.

Key facts

Operator: Digital Realty
Owner: Digital Realty
Size: 600 MW
Acres: 1,435
Location: De Soto (Johnson County), Kansas
First proposed: 2026-06-10
Stage today: In review

Source
read 2026-08-08

What to do next

Next step: An application is in the record. Ask the planning office for the next hearing date and request formal notice.

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What has happened so far (12 events)

2026-04-30financing
Digital Realty's operating partnership closed the acquisition of approximately 1,440 acres at Astra Enterprise Park in De Soto for approximately $475 million in cash and operating partnership units, as disclosed in the company's June 22 press release. · source
2026-06-04hearing
Digital Realty presented preliminary plans for the Astra North data center campus to the De Soto City Council, describing nine buildings on 280 acres requiring 600 MW of power and up to 1 million gallons of water per day. · source
2026-06-09coverage
Ingram's reported Digital Realty unveiled plans for a $4 billion data center campus at Astra Enterprise Park in De Soto with 600 MW capacity across nine buildings, noting the land was purchased in April 2026 from Sunflower Redevelopment. · source
2026-06-10proposal
Digital Realty unveiled preliminary plans for a ~600 MW, ~1,435-acre campus at Astra Enterprise Park near the Panasonic battery plant. · source
2026-06-22announcement
Digital Realty officially announced the Astra Enterprise Park acquisition in an investor press release, disclosing the $475 million price, the Evergy Energy Service Agreement for 600 MW by early 2028 scalable to 2 GW, and that planning and phased development is underway. · source
2026-06-23coverage
KCUR reported De Soto Mayor Rick Walker welcomed data center growth as an opportunity to fund city functions, while resident Toni Caldwell raised concerns about lack of environmental impact studies and rapid development pace. · source
2026-06-25coverage
Commercial Property Executive reported Digital Realty entered the Kansas City market with its $475 million acquisition of 1,440 acres at Astra Enterprise Park, noting it secured an Evergy energy service agreement for 600 MW by early 2028. · source
2026-06-29coverage
Johnson County Post reported the Digital Realty campus would be De Soto's second data center, that the land is already zoned for data centers so no public hearing is required for site plan review, and that Digital Realty committed to fund over $300 million in power transmission upgrades. · source
2026-07-22coverage
The New Lede reported on De Soto residents organizing against data center development, including a national Facebook group 'Say NO to data centers' with 175,000 members run by De Soto-based resident Dally Holloway. · source
2026-07-23hearing
Digital Realty held a community information session from 5-7 pm at DYM Event Space in De Soto; residents attended with questions about water usage, noise, and the approval process, and some noted the company was more transparent than other Kansas data center developers. · source
2026-07-23filing
On its Q2 2026 earnings call, Digital Realty referenced its expansion into the Kansas City metro with 600 MW of utility power beginning to ramp in early 2028 and a long-term runway of up to 2 GW. · source
2026-08-01permit
Digital Realty submitted a site plan application for the Astra North campus to De Soto, with the Planning Commission expected to review it in August 2026; city staff review is underway. · source

Find the paper trail

Find the paper trail (1 filed · 11 places to look)

Permits already on file (1)

Filings we have a source for — the record, not a place to look for one.

2026-08-01
Digital Realty submitted a site plan application for the Astra North campus to De Soto, with the Planning Commission expected to review it in August 2026; city staff review is underway. · source

State environmental permits

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

Kansas KDHE — Bureau of AirThe program page: which permits this state requires, and the office that issues them.
Search Kansas KDHE — Bureau of Air 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 De Soto (Johnson 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 De Soto (Johnson 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.

Southwest Power Pool (Plains) — 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.
Kansas Corporation 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 38.980, -94.970 — 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

Kansas briefing — rates, grid carbon, PUC contacts.

Other tracked projects in Kansas

Project Bluestem — Tonganoxie (Leavenworth County), 10 mi In review
Compass Wakarusa Campus — Shawnee County (Wakarusa area, near Topeka) In review

Cite this page: GridWatch AI, “Astra data center campus (Digital Realty)”, aigridwatch.com/projects/digital-realty-astra-desoto-ks, 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).