In this episode of The Best Dam Podcast, Jill catches up with local advocates and business figures Grant Turner, Celeste Interrante, and Hava Brown. The panel shares their insights on the evolving data center debate in Boulder City, exploring how smart lease parameters, modern technological advancements, and revenue sharing can directly benefit residents.

Grant, Celeste, and Hava reflect on the potential path forward for municipal land—from utilizing closed-loop water systems and requiring self-supplied power to leveraging land leases to lower resident energy bills and diversify city revenue past 2035.

This isn't just a story about data centers; it's about separating fear from fact, protecting natural resources like Lake Mead, encouraging open community dialogue, and securing long-term economic stability while preserving the unique spirit of Boulder City.

DISCUSSION

1. Rethinking the Data Center Conversation: Grant Turner introduces a non-binary perspective on data centers, advocating for strict local parameters and leveraging municipal land leases to help offset utility costs for Boulder City residents.
   
   
2. Understanding Modern Infrastructure: Celeste Interrante breaks down what data centers actually do and highlights technological advances in water conservation, including zero-evaporation closed-loop cooling systems.
   
   
3. Dispelling Nevada Water Myths: Hava Brown shares findings on Southern Nevada Water Authority regulations that restrict evaporative cooling and discusses how large corporate developments can be held accountable to the community.
   
   
4. Strategic Land Management & RFPs: The panel discusses the city's land management process, upcoming council votes, and why issuing RFPs with defined parameters gives the city maximum leverage and transparency.
   
   
5. Power Self-Sufficiency Standards: Exploring a minimum one-to-one co-located power requirement so data center developments do not strain the local municipal grid.
   
   
6. Environmental Safety & Battery Storage: A comparison between data center fire suppression methods and battery storage facilities, emphasizing the need to protect local groundwater and Lake Mead.
   
   
7. Future-Proofing Long-Term Revenue: Addressing Boulder City's economic outlook past 2035, the importance of revenue diversification beyond aging solar infrastructure, and proposals for community task forces.

LEARN MORE

To learn more about the ongoing discussions, local developments, and business initiatives in Boulder City, visit the Boulder City Chamber of Commerce website at https://www.bouldercitychamber.com.

KEYWORDS

Grant Turner, Celeste Interrante, Hava Brown, Boulder City, Data Centers, Land Management Plan, Utility Offset, Closed Loop Cooling, Boulder City Chamber of Commerce, The Best Dam Podcast

#GrantTurner #CelesteInterrante #HavaBrown #BoulderCity #DataCenters #LandManagement #SupportLocal #TheBestDamPodcast

Podcast Transcript 

Jill: Today, guys, we have wonderful guests that are here to help us discuss a different side of what the data center issue is all about, and I am very grateful for their time, their energy, and the research they have all done. So thank you so much. We have Grant Turner. Thank you for being here.

Grant: Good morning.

Jill: Thank you. And we have Miss Beautiful Celeste Interrante. Thank you for being here.

Celeste: Thanks for having me.

Jill: And Miss Hava Brown, thank you for being here, ladies and gentlemen.

Hava: Happy to be here.

Jill: We are so grateful to have good insight, great conversation, because the chamber's not taking any type of a stance on this.

We really wanna be, neutral, middle of the road, but we also wanna provide an education. And so we had, the, the privilege to be able to hear from people who really truly don't believe that a data center is a good fit for Boulder City. We were able to interview Ned, Thomas, our city manager.

He was phenomenal at sharing some of the information from the city side, and now we get to hear from you. So thank you for this other side. Thank you for helping us expand the conversation, and, very grateful to be with all of you. You guys are all great chamber members, so thank you again. So Grant, will you share a little bit about your take?

You've done so much homework. So much time has been devoted to this. Will you share a little bit more about your thoughts?

Grant: Yeah, I'm happy to. I'm pretty clear in the beginning to say I'm not pro-data center. I am pro-Boulder City. if there's a way to Boulder for Boulder City to benefit from data centers, given the fact that in all likelihood data centers are coming, then I think we should steer the conversation.

So rather than looking at the topic just binarily, data centers or no data centers, I think there's a lot more nuance than that. So first, what we're looking at right now is data centers as they exist right now in this moment, which are these massive energy-consuming buildings. but like any other technology, they're gonna get smaller, they're gonna get more efficient, and it would be smart for Boulder City to be positioned to capitalize on the inevitability that data centers are gonna be much, much more efficient and much more easy to accommodate.

So sure, it might not be smart to say, "Let's do a data center absolutely right now and give them unlimited power and let them suck up all our resources." What is a smarter thing to do is say, "Hey, we will entertain the concept, the prospect of a data center under these conditions. If you require power, you are forced to supply the power, co-locate solar or, SMR or whatever it is.

If you... You can only use this much water." Basically, set parameters and hold them to those. Beyond that, my position, the reason why I entered this topic at all, I'm, I am determined to find a way for Boulder City residents to receive free power.

And we have abundant land. We are huge, huge...

We consume about two percent of the energy that's produced in Boulder City. Be-between, Hoover Dam and solar and every other form of power that's produced in Boulder City, we're massive producers. But why then are we still paying for power? That's been my position for years. Going forward, I'm recommending that the City of Boulder City, every future lease, a percentage of the lease revenue be directed straight to the utility fund and start offsetting power for Boulder City residents up to a point.

You know, whatever it is, the first X number of kilowatt hours a month. So maybe your bill goes down 100 bucks, and over time it gets to the point where maybe you have free power. Broadly, I'll wrap it up. I know we got to, we want everybody to get a piece here, but, Boulder City should be deliberate in setting parameters for not just data centers, but all future leases and steer the conversation rather than fold our arms and say, "No data centers in Boulder City." And what is inevitable is they're gonna end up on Henderson land and BLM land within feet of the Boulder City boundary.

Jill: Excellent. Thank you for that information. You're correct, and it is something for us to think bigger.

This has opened up a topic for not only a lot of conversation, a lot of discussion, but for thinking bigger. So what does that look like for future leases? Not just this particular, the DC word, but let's talk about a bigger picture and what does that mean? And I know that every time I have heard you mention or state or post or anything else, the idea that the citizens of Boulder City should be able to have the benefit of these leases, you're speaking exactly what these people wanna hear, and it's catching on, and it's gaining a lot of support.

So thank you for that. So Celeste, will you share a little bit more? I know you are a researcher. That's your history. That's your background. We talked a little bit about that when you were on the podcast last. I know that is your passion, and you have figured out a great way to do it. So will you share a little bit about what you found?

Celeste: Yeah. So like Grant, I am, pro Boulder City. I moved here because I love this, this town. I love everything it has to offer. I love the history. I love the culture. I love how supportive the community is, and they wrap their arms around people. That's where my success with my company has come from. And what I, find is that people get scared of things that they don't know.

So what I wanted to do today was bring some clarity around what really is a data center. If that's what that land is gonna be used for, like Grant mentioned We evolve, and evolution comes with different infrastructure.

And as we evolve, what really is a data center? So I created some notes that I wanted to make sure that the information that I gave was correct.

And so picture the data center, a huge warehouse, but instead of boxes, it has rows of data servers. And those servers run twenty-four hours a day, three hundred and sixty-five days a year. And every time you stream a movie, send a text, an MRI is read, a download is made, you ask GPS for directions. That isn't just floating out in the ether.

It's actually running through multiple servers to compute that information and get it back to you. Kinda like our central nervous system, our brain gets an input, and it runs to your fingers to snap them. Like in an instant that happens. That's how data is run through these data centers. And so bank fraud notifications, that's run through data center storages.

Running calculations behind Google Maps or doing calculations for school or creating documents. If you're using the cloud, that's what this the data centers are meant for. And then also, nowadays, data or AI has been introduced to the commonplace. Whereas before, it was very limited, whether you were in that industry or in a role that required some type of AI use.

Now it's really prevalent. People are making chat photos and using ChatGPT for recipes or to look for restaurants or to give them advice. But a lot of people are misguided on how to actually set up your AI so that it doesn't agree with you, because you can go into a search bar and get the answer you're looking for on any- side of a topic. And so what it What a data center does is, it does create demand. It creates an energy need, it creates heat, it creates all the things that Grant was talking about that there have to be solutions for. And the technology, I was talking to another business owner earlier, the technology, evolves every 10 months.

Like you think about cell phones and you think about operating systems, and you think about having to do updates all the time, technology is advancing. And so what was happening, like Virginia is a really good example of what not to do.

Because but that technology is old. We sat with an engineer on Saturday who was involved in the casino changing over from evaporative cooling to the closed loop systems, and we talked about that with him, and he shared with us how that works, and we equate it to your car's radiator

Jill: Okay

Celeste: or your transmission system. You don't open those up for a hundred thousand miles. Sometimes you don't open your radiator for anything until you have to. And so there's a lot of misinformation out there, and there's a lot of studies that are very recent that people should really seek out as far as getting the information.

Because an informed person is making decisions based on somebody else's perspective. And I don't expect people to agree with me; I just have a position of, let's find the truth. I agree with a lot of what Grant proposed in his position about we need to talk about, okay, offset our energy costs, do all of these things that better Boulder City because the inevitability is coming.

Jill: Right.

Celeste: And so with the Switch purchase of the hundred and seventy-six acres up northern Las Vegas and how The, Townsite Solar is a hedge fund, the joint venture that they have. Yes, they're beholden to their stockholders. They're not sticking around for the long term. So how do we create.

If that's what we wanna do. It's not that if we say, "Yes, we want a data center in this land," that's what's gonna happen. It could be something completely different. But we shouldn't shoot ourselves in the foot and say absolutely no data centers, because we're worried about water, as we should be.

We're worried about electricity, as we should be. But let's make that conversation realistic, and consider it from a business standpoint. What benefits us as we give you this? What do you give us in return? And so that's where I align with Grant, but I also think that anybody listening to this podcast should really start doing some research, 'cause it's astounding.

Jill: It's interesting, too, because as you arm yourself with facts, information, the studies, the data, the statistics, it's an interesting and eye-opening experience. Because, sometimes you only hear the fear factor side of it, and an emotional side of it, which I also wanna take in, because I am an emotional person.

We're all human. So I want to understand that. But you're also sharing, take the time to educate yourself and to understand both sides before so you have an informed decision, and I appreciate your effort on that behalf, so thank you. So Ms. Hava, share a little bit. You and I have had some, small discussions on this.

I know you have also spent a lot of time and energy and a lot of discussion with individuals. So thank you for taking the time to set up appointments and meet with individuals so that you can hear from their mouth what the, their plan is, but also what the, the systems are all about. So can you share a little bit about your take?

Hava: Well, I got into it because I have a lot of friends on both sides of the fence, and in order for me to really, take a stand that I, That I am part of, I did the research and, what got me just this little teeny detail was everyone complaining about water and using so much water and depleting Lake Mead and everything like that.

And I found this profound rule that in twenty twenty-three, the Southern Nevada Water Authority, basically made it they deregulated all evaporative cooling systems. So no data center and no business in general in Southern Nevada is even allowed to have evaporative cooling, and yet everyone on the Internet was talking about how much water everybody's gonna use and it was almost as if did anyone do any research on this whatsoever.

So I found just that one fact that dispelled the huge water myth for me, which led me on a much deeper dive into data centers and, I'm pro-business in general, but,like,Grant and Celeste, I'm pro-business with conditions. I do believe that the businesses that we bring to Boulder City should be held accountable, to helping Boulder City residents and, to not depleting the environment, which I do believe that as data centers evolve, they are gonna become much more efficient.

And these are billion-dollar companies, a lot of them, and what kind of benefit could a billion-dollar company bring to Boulder City? I know Grant talked about, power, which is a great benefit, but let's talk about little things that we also need, like fire departments, maybe some educational scholarships.

We have a lot of nonprofits in Boulder City that work their butts off, and I think it could help. bringing in a large corporation should not be something that we just say no to without doing the proper research and without putting the proper conditions around them. So I would welcome... when we're talking about a land management plan and votes that are coming up I want people to do the research and allow Boulder City to not be hamstrung by not having the ability to do anything with the land.

I want us to have conversations about what should be done with the land. If it's not a data center, what? You know? These are the things that we should be thinking of 'cause progress is coming whether we like it or not. if we it's gonna be in our backyard if we like it or not. Let's have it in a space where Boulder City residents can really take control of what's in our backyard.

Jill: So let's go back to, you mentioned the land management plan. Let's talk a little bit more about that. So you said there's a vote coming up. when this is released, it will be right about the time that the city council will be considering the land management plan. That was part of... This is part of the process that did start, almost six months ago.

The conversation with Townsite Solar happened way over a year ago. They've been in conversations with our city attorney for quite some time. But in this land management process, the idea that it goes through the planning commission, and there are public hearings there. their recommendation then goes to the city council.

City council then, it's introduced to them, and now they're getting ready to vote on whether or not to adopt this proposal into the land management plan. From that l-from that point, let's say in July, the city council says, "Yes, we, we would like to explore this more, put this into the land management."

That then allows staff to have further conversation with whomever the entities are that are interested. But then they have to go out to RFP, right? So while the RFP processes goes into play, the city's also getting appraisals. They need to know what a potential rent would be for that space. So these RFPs mean that Townsite Solar may not be the top bidder at some point in time.

We know they're no longer interested in this. We'll go to that in a second. But if this RFP were to be released, there could be other potentials that come in that might be even a higher negotiated than the two point three million in revenue per year that was estimated with Townsite Solar. So now having that, that process go into play where RFPs go out, other companies would pitch the city with their ideas for what goes to that place, that continues that dialogue.

That continues that conversation, and it allows the city to also be educated on what the appraised value is, so that they now know what a lease rate could potentially be. It feels a little bit like maybe Townsite Solar was a little Maybe a little bit too early Hasty ... hasty maybe

Hava: Yep 

Jill: in exposing and laying all their cards on the table because there could be other companies that come in and go, they didn't get away with this and this, and that didn't they didn't sound good when they said that and that.

We'll spin that differently." But that's where that option for us to craft what this looks like, and like you said, challenge the city to make this be a positive for our Boulder city residents. And without providing that in the land management plan, the city doesn't have that. Yes, they've got the vote in November for potential more development down in the lower transfer area, but it's not talking about the closer proximity that we need to be, I think, discussing.

Hava: Yeah.

Jill: Because I want to know more about what our options are. I think you need all options on the table, inform all the residents, give them all the information that they need before you can move forward. And so I would hope, that the, the city council would open up the thought process to what that could be and have further discussion.

But I also hope that the community understands in the land management process that does not mean a blank check and, oh, they just allowed this. They did not. They allowed for discussion for us to understand more. And so people, I think, have this fear that, And maybe it's a distrust in the city. that's a very prevalent thing.

Maybe it's a distrust in government that they won't have the best interest of the citizens. If that's the case, that's a sad situation, and the city would need to do a lot better job of making sure that the residents understand they will be protected. But without having the discussion, we don't get to go there.

We don't know what's gonna happen. And now we're right back into the throw of this starting all over again. And so, I thought it was an interesting conversation that came up a couple weeks ago. People were asking about da- about battery storage. Okay. So battery storage was what it was originally gonna be part of the conversation.

Tell me what how that isn't dangerous. I'm a little bit concerned about that. We've already had a fire out there. So I love the idea that the, The city can allow for further discussion, further exploration, further knowledge obtaining so that we can move forward with an educated and informed body.

And so I hope that's the direction it goes. But, as we discuss more about, okay, so land management, yes, all of these other options, all the things that are going on, how do you foresee November? What does that conversation and that dialogue look like? Because do we want it more down in the lower transfer area?

Where do we go with that? Grant?

Grant: If the anti-data center people have their way, we're gonna end up in worst-case scenario, which is what I predicted. If they scare the city into not considering data centers, we're gonna end up with multiple data centers. We'll be exposed to a hundred percent of the risk and receive zero value.

A more adult perspective than no data centers would be under what conditions would we approve a data center? If they supply their own power, would you consider it okay? If they only, produce a certain amount of heat, a certain amount of noise, whatever your parameters are, if you receive a direct benefit from that lease, would you then consider it?

So figure out what those parameters are, set them, and then send it out to RFP. And if those parameters cannot be met with current technology, then we wait. What did the first cell phone look like?

It was... You had to have a backpack. You know what I mean? Like

Jill: Yeah. It was like a block 

Grant: there's so much money in this industry right now.

They are spending hundreds of billions of dollars to develop quantum computing and all the things that are way above my pay grade that are gonna miniaturize this technology. They don't wanna have to have giant facilities holding these servers. They wanna pack it, the, the information, into smaller, more easily distributed bits.

They wanna have it easier to cool. They so five years from now, are they gonna be smaller? Almost guaranteed. Ten years from now, I would say that's a certainty. So why not set the parameters, say, "Okay, we are gonna, we are gonna allow for data centers given these conditions," and then we just wait. it will get smaller.

It will get more efficient. And in terms of the-- what to do for the immediate future, I think this is... The, the smartest thing the city of Boulder City could do is say, "Hey, all right, town site," which this probably should have happened already. I think it can still happen One, you have two directions.

If you proceed with BLM, we are gonna provide maximum friction. We are gonna fight you tooth and nail. any mechanism we have to fight you, we will. Whether it's energy, whether it's entitlements, access, any single thing. or alternatively, you pull your BLM ac- your BLM application, you negotiate specifically with us.

We'll negotiate with you on our terms. Because to negotiate from a position of compromise, a position of weakness, which is where we were, we had a gun to our head

I would recommend that the city immediately say, "Either put the gun down and set the BLM application aside, or we are going to go ham fighting you.

We are gonna go all out." then beyond that, here's our parameters. You have to supply your own power. You... Whatever, whatever parameters we decide to set, and then structure the lease accordingly so that we get maximum benefit, so that maybe it reappraises every three years, or it whatever, however you wanna structure the lease so that it's forward-thinking.

There's, I think it's called a ratchet, where ... it can only go up. It can never go down.

Jill: Yeah. Right.

Grant: But be very, very smart and very deliberate on the lease negotiations, and set the precedent now that every future lease, given certain conditions, that the city's solvent, you know, or we've got enough money to run the city and everything.

So long as there's a surplus, Boulder City residents should be benefiting from that surplus. I don't care if it's one penny off the power bill, I am determined that the next lease that we issue in Boulder City residents receive a benefit. Because that guarantees in the future that over time it'll become more, and more, and more.

It can never be less.

Jill: Yeah, I love that concept, and it also helps address those people who are concerned about data centers that, have come out and, said no to data centers. Some of those parameters that they're concerned about would then be built into the potential lease that you're talking of or what a, an RFP should address.

Grant: Correct.

Jill: And so I think that we're speaking the same language. Everybody that has either been on the show, that I have interacted with, really that's what they're looking for is they want to have assurances that it's not going to leach into their drinking water. It's not gonna

Grant: Three things.

Jill: Yes.

Grant: Maximum transparency, maximum community involvement, maximum benefit. That's what we want, and set those parameters. and then you, once those parameters are set, you don't have to fight about every single lease that comes your way. So long as they meet those requirements, you're good.

Go through the process with maximum transparency.

Let everybody in the community have a voice, which I think it's a good thing.

Jill: it- I do

Grant: on the big picture, it's good that Boulder City, It's like an, antibody reaction, you know?

Jill: Yeah.

Grant: It's like the white blood cells have all come out. No data centers. That's good. People really care about Boulder City, but you have to be smart about it, too.

Jill: Yeah.

Grant: You can't attack... You can attack a virus, but if it's, like, healthy bacteria or something, you don't want to be attacking that. Right. And that's what I feel like we're doing at this point.

MD+ 2

Jill: Well, and that's kind of what Celeste was talking about, and, but it's an emotional response, right? They don't have the information.

They haven't been educated. They just hear what their neighbors are talking about. And unfortunately, some of the information isn't completely accurate, and on both sides. Okay. You can pretty much find any study you want to prove whatever point you want when you get on the, on internet. Yeah. So thank you, Celeste, for diving deeper and knowing how to get to true information and not just fluff and superficial and some of the made-up stuff that we know now we have proof that is coming out of China through AI.

They are leading some of those AI answers to be exactly what they want, anti data center, so that they'll get more of those data center opportunities.

Hava: Yep.

Jill: So now that there's proof of that, it makes me want to research and understand more because I do live here. I don't want it leaching into groundwater.

We don't want extra noise. We don't want it hurting wildlife. Those are all really key, environmental issues. We all want to be protected. But I also don't want to close my eyes to opportunity because I have only been fed, hand-fed information that somebody wants me to have.

Celeste: Right.

Jill: So I really appreciate, you know, your deep dive.

Celeste: I took, some time and really looked at the environmental impacts 'cause those are true risks, right? Lake Mead is dropping five to seven feet. I can't remember what the... Anyway, pretty soon, it's we're gonna lose the ability to create electricity out of the dam. Like, it's an inevitable situation.

We all know that. We feel that. I'm sure that engineers that are a lot smarter than me are trying to figure out ways to mitigate that. But in the interim, what is we as laypeople have to look at, we look at what Lake Mead looked like 10 years ago and now we're discovering things at the bottom of the lake that have been hidden, right?

Jill: Right.

Celeste: So I did, after talking with, Hava's friend Sunday night, the engineer that was working on the conversion from evaporative cooling to closed-loop cooling systems for the casinos when they all went through their transition, I looked into. I wanted some actual factual data that I could share so that people could start reading about how.

What is a closed-loop water system? That sounds fancy. I don't understand it. All I hear is we're still gonna use five million gallons of water, you know, a year, or a month, or a day. It depends on what you're reading. So the tech-

Grant: By the way, you know how many gallons we dump in the desert every single day?

Celeste: No. How many?

Hava: At Lake-

Grant: One million. Wow. One million gallons

Hava: That's Boulder City ...

Grant: from Boulder City. we don't

Hava: We never recycle here. Yeah. Yep 

Grant: We, we dump one million gallons of water in the... So when people talk about five million gallons a year, I believe, I could be wrong on this figure, the number of gallons that go through the straws at Boulder City every single day, I could be wrong, I should probably look this up, I think it's 200 million gallons a day.

Jill: Wow.

Grant: So when people talk about five million gallons a year, that's a big, scary number, but what does that mean in the grand scheme of things?

Celeste: Yeah, exactly.

Grant: It's a drop in the bucket.

Celeste: Exactly. And just as a side note, because I was a landscape contractor, I went through the SNWA Smart Water Conservation program back in 2021, 2022, and 67% water loss happens with landscape irrigation.

Jill: Wow.

It's the biggest water loss in our state is landscape irrigation. So it doesn't have to do with building homes. It doesn't have to do with bringing New centers new businesses in. It's actually watering your plants. That's where a lot of this. And so I wanted to share that the technology for reduction in electri- electricity usage and water consumption is already there.

Microsoft is piloting a zero water evaporation closed loop cooling at new build sites in Phoenix and in Wisconsin, reporting an 80% improvement in water usage effectiveness.

It's becoming the standard for all Microsoft facilities in 2027 The CEO actually, reported this at the Build convention, this year, that, it's basically going to use as much water as a small restaurant.

Jill: Wow.

Celeste: And so when we're talking about really compressing that water usage into a smaller number, it's like, oh, okay, the same as the coffee cup uses

Jill: Yeah 

Celeste: or the same as, you know, any of our other restaurants use. That's acceptable to us, rather than these massive water draws. Oracle is deploying a direct-to-chip, closed loop, non-evaporative cooling at the upcoming data centers in New Mexico, Michigan, Texas, and Wisconsin, and they're filled once, and then recirculated indefinitely.

So there's no having to dump and refill.

Grant: Water's not the issue. With data centers, water is definitely It's a

Celeste: 

Grant: it's power.

Celeste: And then we talk about, we talk about the solar and battery microgrids, that help, And I'm learning about this, so forgive me if I, That's why I wrote it all down.

Jill: Yeah, no, I'm fine.

Celeste: So I can make sure. But,it's from the information that I got, and if anybody wants the sources, I'll give them to you. Just reach out to me roughly 30% of all planned US data center capacity is now designed around some behind-the-meter or on-site generation. So it's not actually, like Grant was saying, you've got to figure out your own electricity draw.

Jill: One-to-one.

Grant: Co- Yeah ... co-locate power.

Celeste: Yeah.

Grant: Minimum one-to-one. And it's- If you wanna do more and sell it to the grid, go for it, but a minimum one-to-one, you've got to row your own boat.

Celeste: Yeah. Yep. And you know, you have to look at battery storage along with solar generation because solar doesn't generate when the, when it's dark.

And so you have to be able to store that excess, energy somewhere, and so then the battery storage then keeps the data centers running 'cause they're 24/7/365, right? Townsite, I don't know what you heard at the, 'cause I wasn't able to make it to the, ... to the town hall, but they said that they would not connect to the Boulder City grid.

And so if you've already got this company that wasn't gonna do things-

Grant: Electrical grid?

Hava: That's what it said, yeah. They built their own transmission lines.

Celeste: Yeah.

Hava: So they, the way they explained it to us is that the cost of energy is 50% the energy packets, 50% transmission of the energy. They've built their own transmission infrastructure, so that cost is already gone.

They've paid millions of dollars just to have that done. So the only thing that they're gonna be buying is energy. That keeps the cost down, and they claim would never affect Boulder City. '

Jill: Cause they go through the Mead Transit System.

Hava: Right.

Grant: They can't guarantee that though.

That's like saying, "I'm gonna scoop water out, out of Lake Mead right in front of Boulder City. I'm not gonna scoop water out

Jill: Right

Grant: from Overton." It's the same water. There's a finite amount of power. They're, if they're not supplying their power, they're using power that's on the main grid, and on a systems basis, if you extrapolate that outwards with more and more data centers, we're gonna get pinched.

So the only way for the system to be sustainable is that every single data center supply their own power.

Hava: Yeah.

Grant: Minimum one to one. For them to say that they're, "Oh, don't worry, we're not getting it from here, we're getting it from there," it's

Jill: Yeah, I think there's- ...

Grant: it's like a big, it's just like a lake.

It's no different.

Jill: They were describing it as they were us- going to go through

Hava: Yeah 

Jill: the Mead transmission station, and so the connection between where their site was and to the transmission station, Mead, they would need to use Boulder City transmission lines to get there, and that they would pay $725,000 a year in order to have access to that.

So it sounded to me like their connectivity was really that they were taking energy from California.

Havah, tell me a little bit more about the idea of the yes in November and why you see that as valuable and important.

Hava: I may have mentioned before, I'm very pro-business, but I'm very smart pro-business. I want every business in Boulder City to benefit, including the city. the city is a business.

They need to be able to run the city. I think a yes vote would enable the city to, seek more, big business to Boulder City and be smart about it. It would give them the power to, draw on what Boulder City residents and Boulder City needs. It does not guarantee that they would just sell every parcel or lease every parcel.

But a no vote means that they can't do that. They can't consider bringing good, big business to Boulder City that would, benefit Boulder City residents. I think allowing the city to have the flexibility, to consider big business, consider data centers, consider other types of businesses would be, a great thing for the city to have.

So that's why I think we need a yes in November.

Jill: You can't explore and understand 

Hava: Yes

Jill: what your potential options are if that is not even brought to the table.

Hava: Correct.

Jill: I love that idea. And I know that you had some concerns about battery storage.

Hava: Yes. so based on the fire that we had, I think it was a couple of years ago now, or maybe even last year down at Lake Mead, the amount of water required to not only put out the fire of a battery storage, place, but to keep the other battery storage centers cool enough during a fire required a lot of water and a lot of resources from Lake Mead.

What I have come to understand is that data centers do not require that kind of water if there is an accident or if there is a fire at a data center, that fire suppression systems that don't require water would work for those centers requiring much less water. But, the land is already approved for battery storage centers.

And me personally, I'd rather have a data center than a battery storage center close to Boulder City at any time. So it's just something that I've thought about and hope other people are thinking about that as well.

Jill: So I love your idea of being open-minded when it comes to November. We know that there's a lot of people who are very concerned, and if they don't understand more, they say no just 'cause they don't know, they don't understand it.

Maybe the question was crazy. And so making sure that people are educated prior to November is really my goal. I'm grateful you guys are all here to discuss that. What does that look like in the future? So that transfer area, what other potential opportunities could be there, if anything? I mean, maybe nothing needs to be there.

But explore those options. But, Grant, you have talked a little bit more about what you see the future looks like and what the potential of that area should be or could be, and how it really does we wanna protect our resources. That is something very, near and dear to your heart.

And so share with me a little bit more. You had an interesting experience at Common Ground, an event that was held here just recently that Danielle, Assemblywoman Danielle Gallant put together. And so share a little bit more about the discussion that happened there.

Grant: Yeah, Danielle Gallant invited me to participate in this, I guess you would call it a workshop.

Danielle is awesome, by the way. She's tremendous. And, I was assigned the topic of water usage. And if you focus on the demand, given that the supply is variable, that's a losing strategy because if we... Like we have right now, we had a, snowfall was bad, and we're, I think by September, reaching what they call dead pool, where Hoover Dam becomes maybe non-operable or less, less functional.

So the smart thing to do would be to focus on the supply. And we need desalination plants. The problem with plants is they require a ton of power. So my proposal was you pair desalination plants with small modular nuclear reactors and data centers. And what you accomplish is you have the power, and the power has two customers, day one, side by side, co-located.

So you have-you can sell the power to the data center, which requires a bunch, and you can sell it to the desalination plant. The desalination plant sells the water. It eliminates those two hundred million gallons, that go through the straws every day Lake Mead fills back up. Hoover Dam generates more power.

It's a system. it basically solves the problem. that can happen, I think, what could we do as Nevadans or as the lawmakers? I think that they can leverage the executive branch to get that done, but it does work. If my calculations that Grok helped me with because I use AI, because I'm not afraid of data centers.

If it's correct, 10 of those up and down the coast solves our water problem in perpetuity, and if we need more, we build more. And the pushback to that was, "Oh, that's gonna take, that's gonna take years to accomplish," which the answer to that is, when is the best time to plant a tree?

Jill: Yeah.

Grant: 20 years ago and right now.

So we should be starting immediately. Sure, let's also focus on the usage part of it because that's smart. It's smart to do everything, but we should be attacking the supply side of the equation. and as that relates to data centers and what to do with the election and what to do with our land- Fear is the strongest persuader, and the anti-data center fear, people need to keep in mind, this is being funded by our political or geopolitical adversaries.

Like, I don't know if people know this, but China does not want us to be a player in the data center realm. So if you're out there putting up signs that say, "No data centers in Boulder City," just know you're being played and that this is a fear tactic to get United States to fall behind in, in data centers.

When is it smart to have fewer options? I would say almost never. We should vote yes for data centers so that we have more options, and we should set parameters. We will allow data centers given these parameters. You got a supply room. whatever we set as a city, as our parameters, that we would feel really good at it, including, I'm gonna say it every time I get a chance, Boulder City residents get a direct benefit.

Then it's smart. Solve our water problem and our energy problem, and the data centers will-- that problem will solve itself by setting parameters.

Jill: Right. Thank you. Obviously, we can't put a desalinization plant right here in our dry lake bed, but knowing that is a focus that should be, at least and, you know, looking at the future, what it should look like.

Like you said, we can't hide our head in the sand now. We need to be aware and educate ourselves on some of these different opportunities that are coming down, in the future. So thank you. So Celeste, do you have any last-minute thoughts?

Celeste: Well, I think another controversial topic that I've been, you know, reading on social media and hearing about has to do with, you know, Boulder City being this quaint town.

They love their property values, that data centers cause decrease in property values or businesses go under, that it's just this monster that is ever-consuming and impacts our communities in negative ways. And so there's two studies actually that I wanted to share, and, one is a twenty twenty-five George Mason University study that analyzed home sales in Northern Virginia, which is the more dense populace of data centers in the United States, and found that homes closer to data centers sold for more and those that were farther sold for less. Interesting.

A January 2026 study by IRR examined four large data centers across different Indiana counties using Zillow data from 2021 to 2026 before, during, and after construction of data centers, and found no significant difference in home value or appreciation between homes near data centers and comparable homes elsewhere in the same market.

And so it's just like building a hospital or building any type of other infrastructure. Obviously, if you're closer to, a school in a neighborhood that is full of kids, the, you know, assessed value could go up, but it's also the perceived value. So 'cause you can sell a home for as much as you want, as long as you have a buyer to pay what you're asking, right?

And it's based on that subjective kind of valuation. But when you have data looking at what homes are selling for versus what they're appraised for and how that correlates to the market, they're not finding a difference. And so if we're willing in November-

To limit our options in this land ma- this land use plan, then I think we're cutting off our nose to spite our face because who else is gonna come out there? Because if you put in some massive, let's just say, Amazon facility, they're going to be draining electricity to keep that warehousing. And we're not talking about a 20,000 square foot warehouse.

I do construction cleaning, I see the plans. They're 150,000 square foot warehouse.

Jill: And they have two parcels right across the way 

Celeste: Yes, and 25 foot high to 45 foot high ceilings, that is a lot of space to cool in the middle of the desert. Plus then you've got all of the traffic and, you know, all of the other infrastructure that brings.

So what else do we have out there? I don't think that we should limit it to a very narrow direction of what we want out there, or to say we want nothing out there. I don't think that's right. We have to evolve as, as we grow and as technology evolves. We have to look at, okay, we don't want to add 500 track homes every six months to Boulder City, right?

Jill: That's not who we are.

Celeste: That's not who we are. But we also, look what's going on with the hospital, look what's going on with the school districts and those conversations, and we start looking at the things that are happening, that's a clue- We're regressing to where we're going or not going.

And so we have to be forward-thinking, as Grant and Hava said. We have to start looking at not just today, but what's gonna happen in five years. I plan to be here in five years. I plan to be here in 10 years, God willing, right? So how do we look at what's that benefit? And I don't think by the no vote is gonna do it for us.

I think we really need to keep our focus broad and our common sense hats on, and not limit ourselves, because down the road it could really come back to bite us like it has with this recent withdrawal of, Townsend Solar. Townsend Solar. Yeah.

Grant: If you're not growing, you're dying.

Hava: Absolutely.

Grant: And the economics of it, solar, it...

We are, I think as a city, we are solvent through the year 2035, and beyond that we hit the crossover point where we gotta start cutting costs in order to, to stay solvent. So we do need additional sources of revenue. We cannot rely on solar, especially considering that technology is aging, and we're vulnerable.

We have a lot of eggs in the solar basket, and if a new form of technology comes that is way more efficient than solar, we could conceivably lose a tremendous... Solar accounts for what part of our lease revenue? It's a, I think

Jill: It's a chunk, and I wish I knew that number. I'm sorry

Grant: it's a huge chunk.

I think it's a third. I think it's a third. So- We should be prepared for that.

Jill: You know

Grant: We do need to diversify our sources of revenue 

Jill: that's actually a really valid point. The courage that it took for the city council to venture into the first solar lease whether it was negotiated well or not, we, you know...

It's always easy to look back and say, they should have." But, knowing what we've learned and being able to look at what other communities, whether it's Virginia, Pennsylvania, all these other places, learning from them, understanding what they are utilizing and, where they have things maybe they failed at, that we could fix.

Those are always things you wanna be keeping your mind, abreast to, and also making sure that your council are leading with knowledge and not with emotion.

Celeste: Maybe a good idea would be... Sorry, Hava.

Hava: Oh, it's okay.

Celeste: Maybe a good idea would be to get a task force together to really look into this. And if that is a direction we wanna go into, have a group of business leaders and residents that are unbiased, right?

I'm with Hava. I'm not for or against data centers. I'm for what pragmatically is going to get us to the next level and keep us growing and sustaining and, you know, being energy conscious and conser- I'm a conservative by nature. So maybe, like other cities have, they put together a task force to really start doing some deep dives into, what do we need from environmental studies? What do we need from, these, specific entities that are coming in and wanting to use that land? So I just think that might be a great idea. I do.

Jill: I love that idea.

Hava: Last comment from me. I just wanna talk about that land in general that, we're talking about, the Lower El Dorado Valley.

It is industrial land. It's not like some beautiful resort is going to build there, or some, park, beautiful park is gonna be built there. It needs to be zoned for industrial use, for commerce, for profit, but in a smart way. And in a way that we have control over. So bring on any company.

Could be data center, which to me, you get the best bang for your buck, as I'm looking at other companies that are out there right now, battery storage, and, I just do think, you know, we should not, just say no to anything based on fear or misinformation.

Jill: So thank you. So Boulder City has a thoughtful growth ordinance, and it has been in place for many years.

I would hope that maybe we could look at this concept, much like they did back then, the council, the city, the residents, everybody that helped craft that we look at this as a wonderful way to protect future resources and protect what it is that we love, but do it in a thoughtful approach. You can't be so closed off that we end up being, a pond of mosquitoes that are just gonna eat each other.

We have to have inflow coming and going. We have to have, businesses coming and going. We have to be thinking about what that future looks like, and having an open mind, having a civil discussion, maybe that is a task force. But, having the courage to also realize that if we aren't the ones that are crafting what this message is, crafting what this looks like in the future, it could be very harmful, whether it's the loss of, you know, the two point three million that was just discussed, or if it's a loss of something larger that we don't have the ability to take, as an advantage for us in the future.

So, without your conversation, guys, today, I really appreciate it. I am so grateful that we also have those that don't appreciate the data centers, and I'm glad to hear from them because I've learned so much from all of you. And so thank you for this discussion. Thank you for being willing to be here.

And, thank you for being willing to keep this conversation, this dialogue going, 'cause it's exactly what we need to have citizens that care, understand, and are willing to come to the table with great information. So I appreciate you guys all today. Thank you.

Celeste: Thanks, Jill.

Grant: Thanks for having us