Meta has been publicly identified as the developer behind a nearly 3,000-acre data center campus in Mason County, Kentucky, following an October 13 Mason County Fiscal Court meeting where a community benefits agreement was approved. Under the agreement, Meta will invest $10 billion in the project, generate more than 4,000 construction jobs and 300 long-term positions, and contribute $115 million toward roads, water treatment plants, and pipelines. The county granted Meta a 40-year local property tax break, backed by $800 billion in Industrial Revenue Bonds, with an estimated $10 billion per phase. The site could feature six data center buildings of 718,740 square feet each, three substations, and up to 2.2 gigawatts of power capacity, though a community petition opposing the project had collected 1,429 signatures at the time of reporting.
A single $10 billion commitment to one county-level campus represents one of the largest announced data center investments in a rural U.S. community, setting a potential precedent for the scale of infrastructure deals tied to tax incentives and community benefits agreements. The 40-year property tax exemption and the size of the Industrial Revenue Bond structure will likely draw scrutiny from other localities weighing similar deals.
Meta being named as the company behind a massive 3,000-acre data center project in Mason County, Kentucky is a significant hyperscaler construction story not previously covered in the Digest; the scale and named company make this highly newsworthy.