WOODBRIDGE, Va. — Prince William County is the latest jurisdiction to adopt a plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and find ways for sustainable energy.
By a vote of 5-3, supervisors approved the Community Energy and Sustainability Master Plan during the board meeting on Tuesday. The goals of the plan include cutting greenhouse gas emissions across the county by 2030, using 100% renewable electricity by 2035, becoming carbon neutral by 2050, and starting to prepare for the effects of climate change.
However, amid the boom of data center development, supervisors including Jeanine Lawson, called the plan hypocritical.
“It’s like they’re tearing down the house to build a new front porch,” Lawson told WUSA9. “These board members that voted for it are the same five that are advancing all of these massive data centers and data center sprawl into our rural area which is a key piece of how we protect our local environment and truly reduce greenhouse gases.”
Data centers including the controversial PW Digital Gateway have been a huge debate in the county and a campaign issue for Lawson. Opponents have questioned what the explosion of data centers could do to the environment including the water supply.
Supervisor Kenny Boddye, who helped lead the charge on the environmental master plan, said the county needs to catch up on creating policies to help the environment. He said the plan has been in the works since 2020 before any controversial data center proposals, with the help of sustainability commission members, appointed by the supervisors.
“I'd say they're calling us hypocrites, but their votes speak louder than those words,” Boddye said. “We are the second largest locality in Virginia. If we're not part of the solution, we're part of the problem.”
The plan includes action items such as creating better pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure, planting more trees, adding more electronic vehicle charges, protecting natural water resources and increasing energy efficiency in commercial buildings.
The plan could reach anywhere between $222 million and $412 million.
Lawson, who wanted to defer the decision until a new board takes over in a couple of months, said she wanted to see land use policies included in the plan.
“I think it’s half-baked” she added. “I was against it as a whole because it also has a large price tag to it. It has a fiscal implication.”
In response to questions about what this could mean to taxpayers, Boddye said there’s $1 million reserved to take care of immediate needs, plus rely on regional, state, and federal funding, which some could be accessed now that they have an environmental master plan.
“We have the ability to take a few pennies on the dollar of those data center taxes, which generate hundreds of millions of dollars for these sustainability issues,” he said.
The next steps are to determine the plan to implement the strategies.