The City Council of Provo, Utah, has voted against a rezoning proposal that would have allowed for the construction of a data center.

The council voted on Tuesday to deny an application to rezone a nine-acre land parcel at 1507 S.180 East in Provo from an industrial commercial zone to an industrial commercial data center overlay zone.

Developer B+F Timpanogos Tech was looking to build a 66,000 sq ft (6,131 sqm), two-story data center at the location. It would offer around 5MW of capacity with the potential to reach 30MW depending on demand, and would be grid-connected rather than use on-site generation.

Some $280 million could be invested in the project.

But the council unanimously decided against the rezoning request despite city staff recommending approval, with members expressing concern about the impact of a data center as well as the suitability of the location.

The council told the developer that it could re-apply in the future, according to a report by KSL.com.

The land parcel is located north of the Timpanogos Tech Center, a tech park that is affiliated with B+F Timpanogos Tech.

The site was previously part of a campus belonging to the networking software firm Novell. Founded in 1983, the Provo-based company was acquired by Attachmate in 2011, which in turn was acquired by Micro Focus in 2014, which itself was acquired by OpenText in 2023.

Provo is located south of Utah’s capital, Salt Lake City.