AIBRIEF
Construction began in 2025 before residents knew what it was. DataOne's CEO now concedes the January 2026 town hall should have come months earlier.
In January 2026, Vineland, New Jersey held its first town hall about an AI data center that had been under construction in the neighborhood for months. By then the site was already running 62 gas turbines, with at least 45 lit at any given time, per a Stand.earth-aligned count cited in the report, and had a 1.5-million-gallon LNG tank that neighbors say was never disclosed.
The project is operated by DataOne under a multi-year Nebius agreement signed in October 2025 to deliver dedicated capacity to Microsoft. The deal is valued at $19.4 billion and anchored by roughly 100,000 Nvidia GB300 GPUs. Two local schools sit inside the air-pollution radius, per the community complaint. Residents within roughly a half mile describe a constant low hum.
DataOne CEO Charles-Antoine Beyney conceded on the record that the town hall should have come months earlier. Sustain South Jersey chairperson Matt Williams called it a process failure, asking what step was supposed to catch 62 reportedly unpermitted turbines next to a school before construction began.
The Vineland pattern echoes SpaceXAI's 69-turbine Memphis buildout. The unresolved question is the same: who, if anyone, is supposed to approve this.