Protect Kansas circulating 3-part petition to ban hyperscale data centers

Protect Kansas circulating 3-part petition to ban hyperscale data centers

TOPEKA, Kan. (WIBW) - Both Topeka and Shawnee County now have a moratorium in place for data centers.

Similar to what we just saw happen in Emporia, the group Protect Kansas is collecting signatures to ban hyperscale data centers.

Even with moratoriums in Shawnee County and the city of Topeka, Protect Kansas is taking matters into their own hands.

“The city can change their moratorium at any time. They’ve let us know that they could vote that in and change that any day,” Colleen Campbell, Protect Kansas co-founder, said.

The petition is broken into 3 parts:

- No data centers over 25 megawatts

- Preventing Topeka from supplying water to data centers outside city limits

- “No annexing the data centers from the county into the city,” Campbell said.

“So it’s not completely banning data centers. It’s just saying, ‘hey, we don’t want these hyperscale ones that use a lot of resources,’” Campbell said.

It’s not just about protecting people in the city.

“The county doesn’t have any recourse for a petition or any kind of way for them to have their voices heard,” Campbell said.

The petition needs 6,000 signatures that c...