Louisa County outlines data center rules as Shannon Hill park is sold for $42 million

Louisa County officials outlined how the county evaluates data center proposals and invites public input, and announced the June 2025 sale of Shannon Hill Regional Business Park to Edgecore Digital Infrastructure for $42 million.

A presenter for Louisa County said the county does not take positions for or against private projects during the review process: "The County of Louisa does not advocate for or against any private development projects that are in the conditional use permit, CUP, application or review process." The video described the CUP process as a public, transparent review that can lead to conditions on approvals or denial of an application.

County officials tied their approach to the 2040 comprehensive plan, adopted in August 2019 after two years of public meetings and committee work. The presenter summarized three themes from that plan—conserving the county's rural character, using growth-management tools to prepare for change, and protecting existing and future communities—and said guiding documents are periodically updated with public input.

To balance economic interest and community protections, Louisa County created a technology overlay district (TOD) after public hearings and later tightened that TOD in August 2024. The presenter said the updated TOD reduced allowable acreage and added a requirement that new data center projects obtain a conditional use permit, a step meant to increase opportunities for public comment and to allow the county to attach conditions to approvals.

The video placed the local policy changes in the context of large private investments. It notes that in 2023 Governor Youngkin announced Amazon Web Services' planned $35 billion investment in Virginia, and that AWS then announced an about $11 billion investment for two data center campuses in Louisa County. Separately, the county announced in June 2025 that it sold the Shannon Hill Regional Business Park to Edgecore Digital Infrastructure; the presenter described the sale price as $42 million.

The video framed data centers as offering potential job creation and significant revenue while asserting relatively low impacts on county services such as education and public safety. Viewers were directed to additional Citizens Academy videos and the county website for more information on the CUP process and how to provide input.

The county did not describe any vote or permit approvals tied to the sale or to specific data center projects in the video; those procedural steps and any subsequent permit decisions were not detailed in the presentation.