say NO to data centers and a new power plant at exton park

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These aren’t my words I am about to share, but I agree:

30 years ago residents of East and West Whiteland joined together to stop a “mini city” from being built on Church Farm School land. Thanks to the efforts of hundreds of residents and the township and county elected leaders at the time, we have the 700 acre Exton Park on that land instead.

Their legacy is our treasure, for current and future generations.

But now developers and fossil fuel interests want to put a power plant and massive data center hub on the eastern edge of our beloved park bisected by the Chester Valley Trail. They have lobbied in Harrisburg and won state tax breaks for data centers and billion of dollars in subsidies for “dirty” hydrogen power plants sourced from methane, a false climate solution pushed by the industry to prolong fracking.

In order for their plan to proceed, West Whiteland’s zoning ordinance would have to be amended to allow power plants and data centers in this Laboratory/Office zone. The developer has asked for this amendment and a public hearing has been scheduled for Jan 25, 6:30pm at the West Whiteland Township Building.

🔴 Mark your calendars for Jan 25 and make a plan to attend the hearing. Residents from all over must join together again to protect this space. It’s no place for a power plant and potentially 3 million square feet of data center, up to sixty feet high.

🔴 Join the FB group No Power Plant/Data Center Hub in Exton! To stay up-to-date.

More on the billions in subsidies for blue and grey hydrogen: https://www.pennlive.com/opinion/2022/10/the-hydrogen-bill-gifts-4-billion-to-the-fossil-fuel-industry-opinion.html

(Photo taken last weekend from Old Valley Rd, Exton looking east toward this tract of land beyond the row of trees).

~ Ginny Kerslake

Funny thing about history…does it repeat itself? All of the things going on in East Whiteland and West Whiteland West regarding this whole data center as the second coming of Christ projects and it makes you look back to the past doesn’t it? Because isn’t some of this land that’s in play now part of what riled people up with Willard rows in the 1980s and 90s? Anyway all these clippings are just a little history lesson. Because those who don’t look to the past are doomed to make the same mistakes in the present, right?

Look lively West Whiteland Township and East Whiteland Township. This whole area is at risk again. End, it actually starts down off of S. Bacton Hill Road in East Whiteland where they want the data center plant. And the people behind all this include a former investment banker, and when did an investment banker, become an expert on new forms of energy or is it just about the bottom line?

6 thoughts on “say NO to data centers and a new power plant at exton park”

  1. Of course the greedy East Whiteland supervisors let this go through. No surprise given they took the fast 44 mil to sell the sewer system to Aqua. Once things are gone, municipal assets, open space, they are gone. No one wants to pay more taxes and so whenever a suitor shows up with a few bucks in hand to make a deal, these local politicians take it. Vote for supervisors who are serious about preservation, if they exist.

    • So Steve Gilbert,
      I have to ask where were you at the sewer sale discussions? I ask because they were publicized including by me but NO ONE gave a damn in East Whiteland.

      I don’t like sewer sales but the reality is East Whiteland couldn’t afford theirs any longer and the surrounding issues. But again, people didn’t show up when it could have made a difference.

      Your characterization of the East a Whiteland supervisors was kind of correct in the past, not as much today.

      You also forget an important component in any land development- the municipalities planning code which the Commonwealth of PA has not updated comprehensively since 1969 and THAT guides all zoning.

      Hope you aren’t just a paper Tiger/ Keyboard Warrior and you show up and speak your peace at the West Whiteland meeting.

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