A large Pennsylvania energy company is planning to build a new campus in the state that will include an operations center and a data center that will serve the company's corporate IT needs.

Development approval and other necessary permits are still pending for PPL's construction project in Upper Macungie Township (about 100 miles west of New York City). The center will measure 115,000 sq ft on a 12-acre property.

PPL executive VP and COO William Spence said in a statement the new facility will make the company more efficient and improve service to its electric customers. "This will be a cutting-edge electric system operations center, using the latest technology to help ensure continued safe and reliable service for the 1.4 million customers of PPL Electric Utilities."

The site is about 10 miles west of PPL's headquarters in Allentown.

PPL expects the data center to meet its corporate IT needs for the next 70 years.

The operations center will combine existing transmission and distribution operations centers in Allentown and Harrisburg and host an emergency-response center. It will support the company's subsidiary PPL Electric Utilities, which delivers electricity to about 1.4m customers in Pennsylvania.

The company is planning to begin construction sometime in the September-November timeframe and finish in late 2012.

PPL owns and controls about 19,000MW of generation capacity in the US and delivers electricity and natural gas in the US and UK.