Google Cedar Rapids In review
Data center by Google in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. In review.
Key facts
- Operator
- Owner
- Tenant
- Google DeepMind
- Location
- Cedar Rapids, Iowa
- Stage today
- In review
Source
read 2026-08-14
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.
What has happened so far (6 events)
- 2024-03-21announcement
Cedar Rapids officials publicly confirmed that Google was the company behind the previously unnamed, proposed ~$576 million, 1,396-acre data center project on the city's southwest side. · source - 2025-01-28vote
The Cedar Rapids City Council approved a development agreement/urban renewal ordinance for Google's data center in the Big Cedar Industrial Center, setting terms including a minimum $576 million investment, construction start within three years, and at least 31 new full-time jobs. · source - 2025-05-30announcement
Google held a celebration event in Cedar Rapids to officially confirm its data center project at Alliant Energy's Big Cedar Industrial Center and announced an additional $7 billion investment in Iowa over the next two years for cloud and AI infrastructure. · source - 2025-05-30financing
Google announced $7 billion in Iowa investment covering the new Cedar Rapids data center and expansion of its existing Council Bluffs facility, plus a workforce-development partnership with the electrical training ALLIANCE aimed at increasing Iowa's electrical workforce pipeline by 95%. · source - 2026-06-22coverage
The Cedar Rapids City Council was set to vote on an indemnification agreement giving Google a temporary certificate of occupancy for the first data center building while impacts were evaluated — the concern centered on heat and steam plumes potentially interfering with landings at the nearby Eastern Iowa Airport. · source - 2026-07-23coverage
Cedar Rapids Mayor Tiffany O'Donnell denied allegations that council members received kickbacks tied to the Google and QTS data center projects; reporting found the city manager and utilities business manager had signed NDAs with Google and QTS early in the projects' development. · source
Find the paper trail
Find the paper trail (0 filed · 12 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.
- Iowa DNR — Air Quality BureauThe program page: which permits this state requires, and the office that issues them.
- Iowa DNR document searchSearchable public filings — search the operator, the shell LLC on the deed, and the address.
County & town filings
The rezoning application, site plan, traffic and noise studies, staff report and every revision.
- Search Cedar Rapids 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 Cedar Rapids 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.
- MISO (Midwest & Gulf) — 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.
- 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.
- Iowa Utilities 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 41.930, -91.700 — 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
- Iowa briefing — rates, grid carbon, PUC contacts.
Other tracked projects in Iowa
- QTS Cedar Rapids Data Center Campus — Cedar Rapids (Linn County), 4 mi Approved
- Microsoft Project Osmium — West Des Moines, 112 mi Under construction
- Google Council Bluffs (East) — Council Bluffs, 221 mi
Cite this page: GridWatch AI, “Google Cedar Rapids”, aigridwatch.com/projects/google-cedar-rapids, 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).