Google recently bought close to 500 acres planned for data center development in Kansas City's Northland, Missouri.
The land is reportedly the same plot previously under contract to QTS and located several miles away from a site where the search company has been planning a separate campus.
Citing Clay County property records, BizJournal reports that Google affiliate AG Rose Solutions LLC acquired approximately 493 acres northeast of Interstate 435 and US Highway 169 through Dec. 19 and 20 transactions with Black & Veatch subsidiary Diode Ventures LLC.
A purchase price was not disclosed in the county records.
"We can confirm Google has acquired an additional property in Kansas City, Missouri, for a potential data center," a company spokesperson told the publication. "While we do not have a confirmed timeline for development for the site, we want to ensure that we have the option to further grow, should our business demand it."
The site is reportedly the Rocky Branch Creek Technology Park previously earmarked for QTS.
Black & Veatch subsidiary Diode Ventures filed a preliminary plan for the Rocky Branch Creek Technology Park, a data center campus that would occupy 359 undeveloped acres it controls northeast of US Highway 169 and Interstate 435 in Missouri, in 2022.
BJ notes that Diode last year submitted amended plans for Rocky Branch Creek to fold in two more parcels fronting U.S. Highway 169. They provide for a 492.7-acre project site – known as Project Mica – with six data centers totaling 1.7 million square feet (157,935 sqm), plus space for small ancillary offices and an Evergy switchyard. A 5.5-acre cemetery would be preserved on the campus property. The City Plan Commission is set to review the plans later this month.
"The Kansas City area has one of the fastest-growing data center markets in the U.S., and Diode Ventures ... is excited to see continued development," a Diode spokesperson said.
QTS signed on as a potential customer at the park in 2022, but the contract reportedly expired later that year after stakeholders determined that Evergy Inc. could not supply sufficient power to the property to meet the company's long-term needs.
Diode was originally looking to develop up to nine data center buildings in Kansas City's Northland, together totaling 1.96 million square feet (182,000 sqm), but went on to expand the plans to include as many as 12 buildings totaling 4.3 million sq ft (400,400 sqm). When fully built out, Rocky Branch Creek was planned with a critical IT load of around 215 to 220MW and a full-site capacity of about 270MW.
Google already owns one plot of land in Northland where it is planning a data center campus. October 2023 saw the company file (and later gain permission) to develop up to 1.435 million sq ft (133,316 sqm) of data center floor space on 315 acres in the Hunt Midwest Business Center. The land, located northeast of Parvin Road and Arlington Avenue, was purchased in two transactions, one in 2019 and another in December 2021.
The newly acquired site is close to Diode’s existing Golden Plains Technology Park. The 760-acre site has been acquired by Meta.
Diode also has plans for a third potential campus in the area; it is in the early stages of evaluating Hampton Meadows, a smaller data center site conceptualized for 30 acres it owns south of Golden Plains, between I-435 and Cookingham Drive.
