ST. LOUIS -- The St. Louis Board of Public Service’s unanimous approval of a conditional use permit for the construction of the $3 billion Armory Innovation Data Center project is drawing praise from the IBEW/NECA Electrical Connection. The union electrical industry partnership noted St. Louis Mayor Cara Spencer’s push for more due diligence that ultimately produced conditional use provisions to advance permit approval.

“For 135 years, every generation of our IBEW Local 1 workforce has been prepared to power and connect whatever the nation needs,” said Frank Jacobs, business manager, IBEW Local 1. “Today, that includes hyperscale data centers to support the rapid digitalization of the economy. But we also recognize that development must be right for the community it serves and we are pleased with Mayor Spencer’s diligence to make it so with the Armory Innovation Data Center.”

The mayor noted four key conditional use provisions in a video shared with the public:

·         A guaranteed community investment that includes a $15 million investment in neighborhood infrastructure;

·         A focus on clean energy that requires 50 percent of the data center’s power to come from renewable energy within five years of the data center’s opening, along with enforceable consequences if that goal isn’t met;

·         A requirement that the facility install a green roof, cool roof or rooftop solar panels to mitigate the urban heat impact; and

·         A requirement that the data center must comply with city noise ordinances.

Read the full details of the conditional use permit.

“We are grateful to Mayor Spencer for her leadership in charting a thoughtful and forward looking path for the Armory Innovation Data Center,” said Kyle McKenna, executive director, St. Louis Chapter NECA. “This project represents more than a single development, it sends a strong signal that the City of St. Louis is serious about attracting large scale, next generation infrastructure investment. By pairing strong community considerations with a disciplined and deliberate process that is expected to allow the project to move forward, the city has taken an important step toward creating the kind of certainty and predictability needed to deliver complex projects of this scale. We look forward to continuing to work with the city as it develops a clear and durable regulatory framework to support future data center projects.”

According to the city, “the development is expected to create 200 full-time jobs once completed, including 150 in the Armory, which will be redeveloped as office space, and generate first-year tax revenue of $27.4 million for the City of St. Louis and $33.4 million for the St. Louis Public Schools.”

IBEW Local 1 and St. Louis Chapter NECA form the Electrical Connection partnership which represents more than 5,000 highly skilled and safe IBEW Local 1 electricians and the more than 150 electrical contractors who employ them.  For more than 80 years, the partnership has trained more electricians/communication technicians than any education program in Missouri. Its award-winning work provides safe and reliable electrical construction, maintenance, repair and replacement services across Missouri, the nation and the world. Learn more at www.electricalconnection.org.