Click the link to read the article on the Alamosa Citizen website (Owen Woods):
August 5, 2026
The Rio Grande County Board of Commissioners is the latest government body to place a moratorium on data centers. The commissioners also adopted a resolution prohibiting any large-scale, or hyperscale data centers in the county.
During Wednesday’s regular meeting, the commissioners unanimously approved the year-long data center moratorium to allow the county’s departments to address land use codes. The moratorium is broad as existing language relating to data centers didn’t exist in the county’s codes before. The separate resolution prohibiting large-scale and hyperscale data centers was approved unanimously.
Commissioners said they are using Colorado Municipal League definitions for large-scale and hyperscale.
This decision comes two weeks after a public hearing and work session that allowed county department heads and commissioners to hear the concerns from the public.
Rio Grande County Administrator Skip Schoen said there has been “considerable concern” in the county about data centers as “a category.”
More than 30 people spoke at the public hearing with more members of the public writing in their comments.
The public concern in Rio Grande County echoes widespread concern about data center construction in the rest of the San Luis Valley and much of the country.
Saguache County, the town of South Fork and Costilla County have already adopted varying moratoriums and resolutions to address data centers.
Alamosa County has yet to signal an intent to place a moratorium on data centers as it is currently going through a process with a company called Strata Inc. that intends to build a small-scale, closed loop-cooled data center in the county.
The city of Alamosa will take up a resolution to place a temporary moratorium on “Utility Scale Battery Energy Storage Systems and Large Load Data Centers” during Wednesday night’s regular meeting.