Project Nova (Microsoft Caledonia) Withdrawn
Microsoft withdrew its rezoning application for a 244-acre campus west of the Oak Creek power plant after sustained opposition, even though the village had already voted to approve the rezoning. Microsoft says it is still looking for a site elsewhere in Racine County.
Key facts
- Operator
- Microsoft
- Owner
- Microsoft
- Tenant
- Microsoft
- Size
- 244 ac
- Location
- Caledonia (Racine County), Wisconsin
- First proposed
- 2025-09-01
- Decided
- 2025-10-08
- Stage today
- Withdrawn
Source
read 2026-08-23
What to do next
Next step: Withdrawn — confirm it is dead in the record and watch for the same site resurfacing under a new name or LLC.
What has happened so far (4 events)
- 2025-09-01rezoning
Village documents sought to rezone 244 acres along Douglas Avenue and Botting Road from agriculture to light manufacturing for three data center buildings and a 15-acre substation, identified only as 'Project Nova'; residents learned Microsoft was behind it about a week before the planning commission met (September 2025). · source - 2025-09-01public-comment
Forty of the 49 people who spoke to the Caledonia planning commission opposed the rezoning (September 2025). · source - 2025-10-08withdrawal
Microsoft withdrew its rezoning application, saying that based on the community feedback it heard it had chosen not to move forward with this site; a village board vote set for October 14 became moot. · source - 2025-10-08announcement
Microsoft said it remains committed to building in southeastern Wisconsin and is working with the village and county to find an alternate site in Caledonia or elsewhere in Racine County. · 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.
- Wisconsin DNR — Air ManagementThe program page: which permits this state requires, and the office that issues them.
- Search Wisconsin DNR — Air Management 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 Caledonia (Racine 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 Caledonia (Racine 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.
- Public Service Commission of Wisconsin — 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 42.800, -87.880 — 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
- Wisconsin briefing — rates, grid carbon, PUC contacts.
Other tracked projects in Wisconsin
- Microsoft Fairwater Wisconsin — Mount Pleasant, 6 mi
- OpenAI Stargate Wisconsin — Port Washington, 41 mi Under construction
- Meta Beaver Dam — Beaver Dam Under construction
- QTS Dane County — Dane County In review
Cite this page: GridWatch AI, “Project Nova (Microsoft Caledonia)”, aigridwatch.com/projects/project-nova-caledonia-wi, 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).