State Ag Candidate Pushes for Data Center Pause

Democratic agriculture commissioner candidate Clayton Tucker said Texas should consider temporarily slowing data-center development until emerging technologies can reduce the massive facilities’ demands for water, electricity and land.

Mr. Tucker, a Lampasas County rancher and agricultural researcher, said data centers present a difficult conflict between private property rights and the responsibility to protect neighboring farms, ranches and water supplies. He made the comments at a meeting of the Young County Democratic Party in Graham on July 20.

Although Mr. Tucker did not call for a permanent ban on data centers, he said Texas must ensure that private development does not damage neighboring land or diminish water resources essential to agriculture.

The goal, he said, should be to allow technological development while preserving productive land and creating opportunities for Texas farmers.

“I don’t like ever telling a person what they can and can’t do with their property,” Mr. Tucker said. “But if my property is directly harming your property or your water, then I do think there has to be a little bit of a give and take.”

Mr. Tucker acknowledged that the Texas agriculture commissioner would not have the authority to impose statewide restrictions. Any such policy would require action by the Legislature and governor, he said. However, the commissioner could advocate for agricultural interests as state leaders establish rules for the rapidly expanding industry.

Mr. Tucker said he is particularly concerned about productive farmland being converted to industrial uses that may be difficult to reverse.

“I really hate seeing our productive farmland going for anything that isn’t farmland,” he said. “That’s why I personally just want a temporary pause on a lot of things, just so we can get that technology ready—that we don’t mess up too much farmland.”

His comments come as Stream Data Centers pursues Project Saltworks, a proposed hyperscale data-center campus on approximately 890 acres near Graham. The project has prompted debate in Young County over tax abatements, electricity demand, water use, jobs and private-property rights.

Mr. Tucker pointed to experimental cooling systems that could eventually allow data centers to operate without the large quantities of water used by conventional cooling equipment. One approach involves immersing computer components in a nonconductive, or dielectric, liquid.

He said vegetable-based oils, possibly including hemp oil, could one day be used in such systems. If research proves the technology is safe and effective, Mr. Tucker said, Texas could require data center operators to purchase the oil from nearby farmers.

“You use the local farmers to supply it,” he said.

That arrangement could transform part of a data center’s environmental burden into a new agricultural market, Mr. Tucker said. He cautioned, however, that more scientific research is necessary before such a policy could be adopted.

Tucker also cited developing computer chips that use fiber optics instead of heat-producing copper connections. He said the technology could substantially reduce cooling and electricity requirements while allowing computing equipment to fit into smaller buildings.

Those advances may still be several years away, Mr. Tucker said, strengthening the case for Texas to proceed cautiously rather than committing large amounts of farmland and natural resources to facilities built with current technology.