- Maryland tech industry boosters are promoting data centers as a way to address slow economic growth, job losses and a looming budget deficit, highlighting their potential to generate new employment and significant tax revenue.
- Workforce development is a central focus, with unions, colleges and companies trying to expand apprenticeship programs and training opportunities.
- Sustainability and energy use remain contested issues. Industry advocates cite cleaner local energy production and nuclear potential, while environmental advocates critique Maryland’s reliance on imported fossil-fuel energy and call for stronger oversight of future projects.
In Maryland, a state sandwiched between two others where officials enthusiastically embrace what a local data center boom might bring, one thing is clear: Industry and government leaders are eager to shift the narrative.
The Maryland Tech Council (MTC) highlighted this at its recent second annual data center summit. The event came two weeks after the membership and advocacy group released a report highlighting the industry’s economic potential. The study pointed to Maryland’s stagnant economy — ranking 40th in the nation for job growth and projecting a $3 billion budget deficit in fiscal year 2026 — and suggested that data centers could be a key driver of stronger economic outcomes.
In Frederick County, home to the Quantum data center campus, business leaders pointed to the $50 million in recordation tax revenue generated from data center development so far. Part of that revenue is earmarked for agricultural preservation programs, though critics continue to raise concerns about the loss of farmland.
For Kelly Schulz, the former state labor and commerce secretary who now leads the MTC as its CEO, these critiques are moot.
“There’s an entire pot of money that didn’t exist for ag preservation a year ago,” Schulz said on a panel, adding: “ Preserving our agricultural heritage is really important, but just by the sheer nature of existing, we help to protect agricultural communities in Frederick and across the state.”
What are the jobs?
Here are more key takeaways from the summit at Live! Casino and Hotel in Hanover, along with a breakdown of the data center industry’s proposed economic impact.
Baltimore-based consultancy Sage Policy Group reported that data center construction creates one job for every 275 square feet built. Its report estimates that a 427,000-square-foot facility could support roughly 1,550 construction positions — enough to increase Maryland’s construction workforce by a percentage point. By comparison, the Quantum campus in Frederick County spans 2,100 acres.
The estimate comes as Maryland’s construction industry faces a five-year decline, losing 13,000 workers, according to the report. Zack Fritz, COO at Sage Policy Group, who led the study, noted that while construction jobs are temporary, they have ripple effects: Adding 300 positions, for example, could spur new housing developments or retail projects.
Dana Blackwood, business manager at Turner Construction Company, believes data center construction jobs show no signs of disappearing, even as the specific demands do. The company works on different data center projects, but Turner’s marketing manager declined to name any because of non-disclosure agreements.
“When we first started with data center construction, it was for server storage, then it was back up to the cloud. Now, it’s language learning models,” Blackwood said. “Maybe the application evolves, but I don’t really think there is an end in sight, just the ways in which we’re going to leverage the power of what they make possible.”
The report also points to the jobs inside the centers — engineers, technicians and security personnel among them — with the average data center employee making $100,000 per year. The report did not break down those salaries by position.
Can the workforce meet the opportunity?
Alongside the job potential, industry leaders emphasized the need to develop a skilled workforce. Blackwood pointed out that the construction industry is currently facing a shortage of available workers.
“We could probably stand, across the construction industry, to hire another million craft workers right now,” Blackwood said, using a term for a skilled construction worker mainly trained in one field (i.e. electricians or carpenters.) “We’re having to get creative, because it takes time to grow that workforce, train them and have them then available to make an impact in that backfill.”
Rowan Digital Infrastructure, a co-sponsor of the summit and developer of data center projects in Frederick, is partnering with Frederick Community College on an apprenticeship program that will give students hands-on training at data centers.
“We’re really building an ecosystem of opportunity here,” said Martin Romo, senior director of economic development and policy at Rowan. “It’s a sizable set of opportunities to build facilities here at the Frederick Quantum campus, so we’re making sure that we have that local talent available.”
Mike McHale, business manager at IBEW Local 24, a labor union that represents electrical workers from Frederick to Ocean City, said data center projects have grown the union and helped members find work without leaving the state. Four years ago, the union had 1980 members; now, it has 2700.
“It’s given us the opportunity to increase our membership, increase our apprenticeship and provide more opportunities for workers in our area,” McHale said. “If we didn’t want to grow, we’d probably have enough to keep us busy, but you have to diversify.”
He’s also encouraged by how the industry has expanded membership in Local 26, which covers nearby Northern Virginia — widely regarded as a global data center capital — and now totals over 10,000 members.
McHale said the union’s apprenticeship programs prepare members for data center work, but employers are also giving members more opportunities to train in technical positions. Those include Computer Aided Design operators, who use software to create models for construction projects.
Are the tax structures maximized?
Data center developments in Maryland generate significant tax revenues for both the state and local governments, with construction alone creating hundreds of millions of dollars in economic activity, according to the Sage report.
Every one million square feet of a facility can produce over $16 million in annual tax revenue, including income, sales and energy-related taxes. One key difference between some Maryland counties’ tax structures and Northern Virginia’s is how businesses’ personal property — the servers and equipment inside data centers — gets taxed.
Loudoun County, Virginia, home to “Data Center Alley,” has a personal property tax rate of $4.15 per $100 of assessed value, according to the county’s website. A Virginia state analysis found that localities with data centers derive a significant portion of their tax revenue from business personal property taxes, though some have lowered these rates to attract new companies.
Although Maryland law allows Frederick County to levy a business personal property tax, the county has chosen not to apply it to data centers. The County Council recently drafted a bill to create new business personal property subclasses for data centers, part of a package it plans to submit to the state delegation for the 2026 General Assembly.
Is Maryland a more sustainable home for data centers?
Energy generation for data centers was a major topic of concern at the summit.
According to a 2023 report by the US Department of Energy, data centers consumed approximately 4.4% of total US electricity that year and are projected to consume between 6.7% and 12% by 2028. This rapid growth is largely driven by the increasing energy demands of artificial intelligence applications.
Brian Gitt, senior vice president at nuclear energy company Oklo, emphasized during a panel the urgency of addressing energy demands and the need to streamline regulations for developing new nuclear plants.
“The energy grid is the backbone of modern civilization,” Gitt said. “Everything we care about, our health care system, emergency services, our education system, all of it relies upon 24/7 reliable power, so this is an absolutely paramount issue.”
Gitt views expanding nuclear power as a crucial way to strengthen the power grid. However, environmental activists question its sustainability, citing the challenges of safely disposing of nuclear waste.
The Sage report highlights Maryland as a cleaner location for data centers, citing that the state produces fewer carbon dioxide emissions per megawatt-hour of energy than its neighbors. But, Angie McCarthy, of the DC-area environmental group Nature Forward, called those claims misleading, noting that Maryland imports most of its energy from states like Pennsylvania and West Virginia, which rely heavily on non-renewable sources.
Rowan is working to lower the environmental impact of its data center construction by designing cooling systems that recirculate water multiple times and leasing exclusively to companies committed to running on renewable energy, according to Romo.
McCarthy pointed to Gov. Wes Moore’s 2024 Critical Infrastructure Streamlining Act, which eased restrictions on backup generators at data centers, as a source of concern. Still, she’s encouraged that Maryland has the chance to learn from Northern Virginia’s challenges and hold new projects to higher standards.
“We here in Maryland are very lucky in that we get to learn from the mistakes of our neighbors,” McCarthy said. “But gone are the days where no questions are asked about how they will impact our communities.”
