Project dossier · Lyon Township (Oakland County), Michigan

Project Flex Awaiting decision

Verrus (with Walbridge as general contractor) is developing the Project Flex data center on Milford Road in Lyon Township. The Planning Commission gave initial approval on Sept 8, 2025; final site-plan approval review is anticipated at the commission's Aug 24, 2026 meeting. Verrus is offering a $10M community benefits package and its attorney has warned of legal action if approval is further delayed; residents organized as 'No Data Center Lyon Township' oppose the project.

Key facts

Operator: Verrus
Location: Lyon Township (Oakland County), Michigan
Hearing: 2026-08-24
Stage today: Awaiting decision

Source
read 2026-08-14

What to do next

Next step: Heard 2026-08-24; 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 (14 events)

2025-08-07filing
Walbridge submitted the Project Flex site plan application to Lyon Township planning authorities for the 1.8-million-square-foot, 172-acre data center campus. · source
2025-09-08vote
Lyon Township Planning Commission gave initial approval to Project Flex. · source
2025-12-01protest
In December 2025 a Facebook opposition group titled 'NO DATA CENTER in Lyon Township' grew to roughly 2,000 members, citing concerns about electricity infrastructure, water usage, and environmental impacts. · source
2025-12-11announcement
Lyon Township issued an official press release/statement addressing questions about the Project Flex data center site plan. · source
2026-01-07report
Consulting firm Kimley-Horn completed a noise study for Project Flex, a condition of the site-plan approval. · source
2026-01-08coverage
Lyon Township issued a statement indicating the Planning Commission may be revisiting the conditional site-plan approval, saying final approval depends on independent review of the sound study and energy audit. · source
2026-01-12protest
About 125 residents attended a Lyon Township Planning Commission meeting to voice opposition to the 1.8-million-square-foot data center. · source
2026-01-22hearing
Lyon Township held a study/informational meeting on the Project Flex data center; residents staged a protest outside before the meeting. · source
2026-03-02vote
The Lyon Township Board of Trustees enacted a six-month moratorium on new data centers and facilities over 100,000 square feet, running through September 8, 2026, while it reviews ordinances. · source
2026-04-27filing
The Oakland County Election Commission approved recall petition language targeting all seven Lyon Township trustees, an effort organizers tied to opposition to Project Flex. · source
2026-05-27filing
An attorney for Verrus submitted a Final Site Plan response letter arguing the project meets township codes and warning of legal action if approval is further delayed. · source
2026-06-08hearing
At a Lyon Township Planning Commission meeting, dozens of residents, including State Sen. Jim Runestad, spoke during public comment opposing Project Flex. · source
2026-07-01vote
In July 2026 Lyon Township postponed a decision on the data center, including whether to accept a $10 million community-benefits offer from Verrus. · source
2026-08-24hearing
Final approval review anticipated at the Lyon Township Planning Commission meeting. · 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.

Michigan EGLE — Air Quality DivisionThe program page: which permits this state requires, and the office that issues them.
MiEnviro PortalSearchable 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 Lyon Township (Oakland 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 Lyon Township (Oakland 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.

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.
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.
Michigan 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 42.510, -83.650 — 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

Michigan briefing — rates, grid carbon, PUC contacts.

Other tracked projects in Michigan

OpenAI Stargate Michigan — Saline, 24 mi Under construction
Augusta Township data center (Thor Equities) — Augusta Township (Washtenaw County), 26 mi Denied
Deep Green downtown data center — Lansing (Ingham County), 48 mi Withdrawn

Cite this page: GridWatch AI, “Project Flex”, aigridwatch.com/projects/project-flex-lyon-township-mi, 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).