Industrial Park or Data Center?
Mr. Ronald Ham insists there are only two options. Those options are data center or landfill. In The Brantley Beacon on April 1, 2026, he stated that — there are only two options no matter what others may suggest. If you don’t own the property, you can’t provide options.
Property rights are funny that way. His arguments dismiss the fact that as of 3-12-2026, the land was still for sale. I was not told of any restrictions on who could buy the land.
A price of $14 million with EPD permit included in the sale was told directly to me by the head lawyer for the Brantley County Development Partners, LLC. I asked Mr. Ham, directly, what the selling price was, and he responded by stating 25 million. The Brantley Express has quoted that’s the same amount of $25 million.
I think a reasonable person would question why the large difference in the actual selling price and the price that he, Mr. Ham, quoted.
A reasonable person should consider this land for sale as an obvious option, but Mr. Ham repeatedly states it has to be a landfill or data center. He totally refuses to acknowledge the county could purchase the land and create a second Industrial Park. It would have definite advantages of being closer to the Brunswick Port Authority and Interstate 95.
Brantley County has previously offered $10 million for the property. The current asking price is $14 million. I believe it is possible to get grants to help develop it into our industrial park that could employ more people than a data center.
I contacted Alisha Vaughn with ACCG (Association County Commissioners of Georgia), and I am waiting to hear from her.
He states that natural gas would be used to create their (data center) own electricity. So there is no impact to our electricity bills. This may be a clue to the actual size of the proposed data center.
Very large data centers require more power than the electrical grid can provide. As a result, they turn to natural gas generators.
A Big Data center can use as many natural gas generators as a natural gas power plant would use. The main pollutants resulting from natural gas electricity are the generation of nitrogen oxide, which has harmful effects on the respiratory system.
The pollution tends to linger in nearby communities. Some of the hightest polluting natural gas power plants can omit over 100 tons of nitrogen oxides per year.
If you think that it’s only one data center, you may very well be wrong. I met a man from Hinesville. I asked him if they had a data center. He replied that they did not.
I told him about the proposed data center for Brantley County. He asked me if I knew Ron Ham? I replied, “yes”, and he began to tell me an exact location Mr. Ham had told him about.
The location was not between Waynesville and Atkinson. However, it was in Hortense. I spoke with another person with ties to the Republican Party from another county and it sounded like Mr. Ham has big plans for data center(s) in Brantley County.
Mr. Ham offers the people of Brantley County a claimed possible 33 percent reduction in property taxes. He forgot to include the value of clean air, the value of not hearing a constant hum which makes many people regret being any where near a data center. Some communities have complained about noise levels at distances over 2 miles.
The system he describes is not a closed loop cooling system. A closed loop system is completely sealed. However, it still uses water for evaporative cooling. The amount of water usage is hard to determine and the Waynesville and Atkinson location is a recharge area for the aquifer.
The county could purchase the property. The people could decide on its use. If it is decided the citizens want a data center, the Development Authority could take bids on the property to sell it for a data center.
It would be sold to the highest bidders and we could recap the benefits the middleman or broker would normally receive. Also, I did find out there are grants to help build infrastructure for a second industrial park.
The push for a quick decision in the data center ordinances and Land Use change would complete the much needed value adding aspects the potential buyer is waiting to get. It could easily make the land worth millions per acre. We need to realize this fact and take advantage of it for the county.
I want the best for this county and the county’s purchase of the land would make us winners either way.
Robert H. Wilson Jr.
Brantley County
