Washington State lawmakers passed a temporary sales-tax break for data center developers and operators in the state, according to an Associated Press report. The sales and use tax exemption on servers, software and electrical infrastructure components for rural area data centers will kick in April and expire in 2018.
 

The state has been attractive to data center developers because of its relatively cheap hydro-electric power and the new law, approved by the state legislature on Wednesday, adds another incentive for building mission critical facilities there. States compete to attract data center development to create construction jobs as well as property tax revenue.
 

\"The revenue generated for the local government is astounding,\" Rep. Mike Armstrong, R-Wenatchee, told the Associated Press. \"There are two or three, or maybe even four of these data centers that are ready to go immediately.\"
 

The new bill carries a price tag of about $28 million for the state - sales tax revenue it will lose every time a new data center is being fitted out or an existing one goes through a technology refresh. This Revenue Department estimate is based on a 525,000 square-foot data center.