Henrico County's 37 Data Centers Trigger 25% Power Hike; Schools Told to Unplug

Henrico County, Virginia—home to 37 data centers—just told its teachers and first responders to turn off their computers and close the blinds because the grid can't keep up.

County Manager John Vithoulkas sent an email on June 26 to thousands of employees, including school staff, warning of a 25% increase in electricity rates starting July 1. That's an estimated $5 million in extra costs next fiscal year for government and school facilities. His request? "Turn off your lights… turn off your computers/laptops… adjust the blinds… unplug appliances." Space heaters? Don't even think about it—each one costs the county $150–300 per year.

The Data Center Math Doesn't Add Up Locally

Henrico County sits just outside Richmond, population 350,000, and hosts clients from Meta (built a data center in 2017) to xAI. Seventeen more data centers are in the pipeline, including plans to convert Civil War battlefields into server farms. Meanwhile, the local power infrastructure hasn't kept pace. Developers promise new transmission lines, but those take years. In the interim, they lean on temporary gas and diesel generators—over 300 diesel generators have been proposed for some new facilities in Henrico.

Ratepayers absorb the gap. Last year Virginia's legislature approved a rate hike that included measures to shield residents from data-center-driven increases. It didn't work. One Henrico woman saw her electricity bill double in January despite solar panels and a heat pump. The county's response is to ask employees—teachers, police, firefighters—to tighten their personal energy usage rather than confront the structural imbalance.

Temporary Generators, Permanent Costs

This isn't an isolated story. In Mississippi, an xAI data center runs on 27 gas turbines belching pollutants. In Henrico, officials admit some new data centers may rely on hundreds of diesel generators until permanent power arrives. But those generators still plug into the grid for base load, and every new connection jacks up rates for everyone else. The email from Vithoulkas acknowledges the discomfort but frames it as a collective sacrifice: "Each dollar we can save by conserving electricity is another dollar the county can reinvest into staff."

That's a polite way of saying the data center boom's externalities are being offloaded onto the public sector while the facilities themselves enjoy favorable tax treatment and grid access. Until power infrastructure catches up—or permitting and construction timelines shrink—this pattern will repeat in every county that chases data center tax revenue without securing grid capacity first.

Henrico County's request for comment went unanswered. But the math is clear: 37 data centers plus 17 more equals rate hikes that no amount of shade-drawing and computer-shutting will fix.

Source: County with 37 Data Centers Asks Schools to 'Conserve Electricity'
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