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An ordinance declaring a temporary moratorium upon the acceptance, processing, approval, and issuance of zoning, building, or grading permits for data center developments on property within Nashville & Davidson County.
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WHEREAS, the Metropolitan Government of Nashville and Davidson County has authority to regulate land use and development through Title 17 of the Metropolitan Code of Laws, known as the Metropolitan Zoning Code, to protect the public health, safety, and welfare; and
WHEREAS, the Metropolitan Zoning Code does not currently define "data center" as a distinct land use classification; and
WHEREAS, in the absence of a specific data center classification, data centers may be administratively classified under existing use categories that were not written to address the scale, intensity, operational characteristics, or impacts of modern data-center development; and
WHEREAS, data centers may have land-use impacts materially different from ordinary office, warehouse, telecommunications, utility, or industrial uses, including high electrical demand, backup generators, fuel storage, battery systems, substations, transformers, cooling systems, mechanical equipment, noise, vibration, lighting, stormwater impacts, security fencing, emergency-response concerns, and continuous twenty-four-hour operations; and
WHEREAS, data centers may be appropriate in certain locations if properly defined, reviewed, conditioned, buffered, and regulated, but may be incompatible with nearby residential neighborhoods, public parks, schools, greenways, zoological institutions, public spaces, and other sensitive uses without appropriate standards; and
WHEREAS, the Metropolitan Government has a substantial public interest in ensuring that data centers are not permitted or vested under land-use classifications that do not accurately describe the principal use or address the use's operational impacts; and
WHEREAS, on June 2, 2026, BL2026-1391 and BL2026-1392 were introduced a...
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