TexAmericas Center, which owns and operates one of the largest mixed-use industrial parks in the United States, announced today the dedication of a unique piece of property with the intent to develop green energy data centers, suitable for major companies looking to expand and enhance data storage capabilities.
Storing, managing, and distributing the world’s data requires a tremendous amount of energy. In fact, data centers alone account for almost two percent of the electricity use in the Unites States – a number expected to grow exponentially given demand projections. Electricity use, greenhouse gas emissions, and large amounts of water required directly for cooling and indirectly for electricity generation, all contribute to a significant carbon footprint.
The property has over 400 acres of developable land and has attributes suitable to house hyperscale, corporate, retail or similar data center applications.
The site boasts dark fiber, access to over 350 megawatts of power, 3.5 milli-second round trip latency to the DFW and Little Rock markets and is within the reliable Southwestern Power Pool grid.
What makes this property unique will be its access to three sources of alternative energy for operations. The property allows for the use of wind and solar power to support the operation of a data center, which historically would require high levels of energy consumption, as well as the potential for raw water, effluent, and methane gas.
“Data centers are among the most energy-intensive building types, so affordable and reliable energy sources that keep the environmental impact in check is a major consideration in the site selection process, and the Park has dark fiber and high-capacity 100Gigabit services immediately available,” said TexAmericas Center Executive Vice President & Chief Economic Development Officer Eric Voyles. “TexAmericas Center offers low-cost, reliable energy produced from diverse sources, including green energy options, and this property is a testament to our commitment to growing green high-tech jobs in Texas.”
In 2021, TexAmericas Center commissioned CBRE Network Advisory Services to perform a connectivity report on the Texarkana region. That study concluded Texarkana is served by several long-haul fiber networks and multiple metro fiber networks. CBRE’s analysis also found that because TexAmericas Center, which is a State of Texas special purpose district, owns about 200-miles of road and over 30-miles of rail, in addition to its 12,000-acres of land, so securing additional right-of-way easements will be easy.
The Point-of Presence (POP) for the Texarkana region is nearby and fiber optic lines already connect the Green Data Center Park property to the POP.
“There are enough fiber providers in the immediate area to support any type of application, such as a data center or high-tech business campus,” said CBRE Vice President of Infrastructure Consulting, Mike Spieldenner.
This makes the site suitable for major companies like Google, Meta, and AWS, but also ideal for retail-oriented hosting or data center facilities without costly augmentation. The potential for adjacent green energy alternatives makes it an even more ideal location for companies also seeking access to a reduced carbon footprint.
“Data center owners and operators are increasingly interested in ways to affordably operate while minimizing their environmental impact,” said TexAmericas Center Executive Director & CEO Scott Norton. “The development of this piece of property also has the potential to create great paying, quality jobs, attract more hi-tech businesses, bring cutting-edge technologies to local communities, and add significant revenue to the Texarkana region.”