By Lee Burnett
A Texas company is exploring the feasibility of developing a massive data center in south Sanford.
New England Energy owns 1,060 acres of woods and has been quietly inquiring about the suitability of the site for a 100 to 300 megawatt capacity data center. Existence of the potential project burst into the open during a Maine legislative committee last week, and more details are surfacing.
A 100 MW data center would represent a capital investment of $900 million to $1.5 billion, according to Cushman & Wakefield’s 2025 Data Center Development Cost Guide. It would dwarf anything on the drawing boards to date in Maine. A 5-6 MW data center is under development at the former Loring Air Force Base in Aroostook County and could scale up to 50 MW.
“This is an historically large economic investment opportunity for Sanford, and one that I think is really needed,” Sen. Matthew Harrington, R-York, said in a telephone interview Wednesday. He was first to disclose the parameters of the project last week, in an attempt to derail a proposed two-year moratorium on data centers under discussion at the Energy and Utilities Committee. He said the project represents 100 long-term jobs and is “well on track to happen.”
“The city is very much on board, they’re very excited about this project,” Harrington told the Energy and Utilities Committee, on which he serves.
Data centers are considered backbone infrastructure for the digital economy. But the explosive growth of AI is triggering grassroots backlashes among citizens eager to slow things down so the full consequences can be considered. In December, a huge citizen outcry forced the Lewiston City Council to unanimously reject a proposed 24 MW data center, the details of which were made public just a week earlier.
One of the constraints in siting a data center is the availability of large amounts of water to cool servers, storage systems and networking gear equipment. Sanford Water District Superintendent David Parent said he was approached by developer Randy Gibbs, whose family owns New England Energy, and assured him that the district has “all kinds of water.” The district pumps about 1.5 million gallons a day, slightly more than half what it was pumping 20 years ago, he said. A 12-inch water main crosses the property, he said.
Another siting constraint is the availability of large amounts of continuous power, according to Rep. Daniel Sayre, D-Kennebunk, whose district neighbors Sanford and who is a member of the state’s disbanded AI Task Force. “I struggle to understand that we (Maine) would have the scale of energy that would be needed,” he opined. “Maine is quite unattractive because of the cost of electricity.”
In this case, power would not be drawn from the electric grid, but would be developed on-site through hydrogen fuel cells supplemented by solar, according to Harrington. The isolation of the power source protects grid capacity and ratepayers from impacts, he said. He said northern states are where data centers should be built because the cooler climate reduces the need for coolant.
The red line follows the borders of land owned by New England Energy
Photo: City of Sanford AxisGIS
The sponsor of the moratorium, Rep. Melanie Sachs, D-Freeport, said Harrington is minimizing the impact of a “behind the meter” data center on the grid.
“They would still need some sort of backup power,” she said in a telephone interview. “There are impacts around the backup operational needs.” In addition, utilities have to build their own infrastructure to handle the highest loads forecasted in order to ensure reliability. (Harrington said he understands on-site diesel generators would provide backup power.) Sachs described a moratorium as breathing room to develop thoughtful policies in the face of rapid deployment of AI. Not only should the state develop policies on the best locations on the grid for data centers, but it should provide guidance to cities and towns on community benefits beyond tax revenue that they should expect from developments of such magnitude.
“I know what it’s like to have economic development dangled in front of you,” Sachs said.
Sachs said company representatives have been invited to a work session of the Energy and Utilities Committee, which was scheduled for Thursday. Harrington said he expected the company would send someone to that meeting.
The Sanford Springvale News left two phone messages for Gibbs but has been unable to reach him. Gibbs is founder and owner of Multifuels of Houston. He has 40 years’ experience in the oil business, developing pipelines, terminals, natural gas storage, and various forms of renewables. The Gibbs family has owned the Sanford property since 1975, when Gibbs Oil proposed developing an oil refinery. A casino and an amusement park have also been proposed for the site.
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