Blackstone's QTS terminates Virginia data center project after legal defeat

QTS, a data center company owned by Blackstone, cancelled its Digital Gateway project in Prince William County, Virginia on 2 July 2024. The company had spent four years trying to build a huge campus covering 2,100 acres, but courts overturned the local government's approval after community groups and historic preservation campaigners took legal action. QTS withdrew its final appeal and ended the project.

The planned campus would have brought tens of billions of dollars in investment and thousands of jobs to the county. Virginia already holds the world's largest concentration of data centres, and demand from artificial intelligence and cloud computing has pushed construction to record levels. However, residents have grown increasingly concerned about electricity use, water consumption, and environmental damage. Around 75 similar projects across the United States were blocked or delayed in early 2024.