The conversation about large-scale data centers coming to Montana is growing louder — and Great Falls residents are making their voices heard on both sides of the debate.
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The Great Falls Development Alliance has formed a Data Center Task Force to explore the potential benefits and drawbacks of data center development in the region. GFDA President and CEO Brett Doney says the goal is simple — learn as much as possible, together.
"We wanted to dig in to data centers and learn. And whenever we can, we like to do it as a community. So, they're open meetings," Doney said.
On the benefit side, Doney points to property tax revenue as a significant potential upside for Great Falls and Cascade County.
"Since our cities and counties, and even the state are heavily dependent on property tax, data centers can generate a very significant amount of property tax, which then lowers the burden on residents, as well as small businesses," he said.
Data centers also bring construction jobs and non-permanent operational positions to the communities where they are built.
But not everyone is convinced the benefits outweigh the risks. In July, Gov. Greg Gianforte signed President Trump's Ratepayer Protection Pledge — a commitment requiring data center companies to pay the full cost of their energy and infrastructure needs rather than passing those costs on to consumers. The pledge was also signed by major tech companies including Amazon, Google, Meta, Microsoft, OpenAI, Oracle, and xAI.
The five-point pledge requires companies to build, bring, or buy their own power supply, pay for all new power delivery infrastructure upgrades, pay for power whether they use it or not, invest in local job creation and workforce development, and contribute to electric and community resilience.
Some Great Falls residents say the governor's pledge is a step in the right direction — but local safeguards are still needed.
Gordon Whirry, a member of the Golden Triangle Resource Council — a conservation group with members across four counties in north-central Montana — says Montana's lack of regulation is making it a target for massive data center developers.
"Montana has become attractive to some of these massive data center developers. They like the fact that we have lots of land, lots of water. No sales tax at the moment. No regulations to speak of," Whirry said.
For Whirry and the Golden Triangle Resource Council, the stakes are high.
"It could affect our utility rates, our ag land, our water consumption, our air quality, our taxes, our public services," he said.
The Golden Triangle Resource Council is hosting a public meeting at 7 p.m. on July 21, at First Methodist Church in downtown Great Falls. Attendees will have the opportunity to review and sign petitions asking Cascade County commissioners to develop specific regulatory safeguards for data center development in the region.
Elsewhere in Montana, data-center proposals have emerged in Bonner, which is south of Missoula, Butte, and Broadview, which is north of Billings. The Bonner and Butte projects have stalled, while developers in Broadview say they're moving forward despite comunity opposition.
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