Full Title: Data Centers in Virginia 2024
Author(s): Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission
Publisher(s): Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission
Publication Date: December 9, 2024
Full Text: Download Resource
Description (excerpt):
Data centers provide positive benefits to Virginia’s economy mostly because of the industry’s substantial capital investment. The primary benefit comes from the initial construction of data centers. Most construction spend in likely remains in the state economy because much of it goes to Virginia-based businesses providing construction materials and services.
Data centers employ fewer employees than some other industries, but data center jobs tend to be high paying. Several data center representatives indicated that a typical 250,000-square-foot data center may have approximately 50 full-time workers, about half of which are contract workers. Data center construction supports a substantially larger number of workers. Construction of an individual data center building usually takes about 12 to 18 months, and data center representatives indicated that, at the height of construction, approximately 1,500 workers are on site from various construction-related industries.
Overall, the data center industry is estimated to contribute 74,000 jobs, $5.5 billion in labor income, and $9.1 billion in GDP to Virginia’s economy annually. Most of these economic benefits derive from the construction phase rather than data centers’ ongoing operations. The economic benefits from the industry are concentrated in Northern Virginia, where most data centers are located, but other regions of the state also benefit because data centers are also located there, or they are home to businesses that provide materials for data center construction.