By Shirleen Guerra | The Center Square
(The Center Square) – A new $2 billion data center campus is coming to Stafford County, showing how Virginia’s data center boom is spreading south from Loudoun County, where most of the world’s internet traffic runs today.
Vantage Data Centers plans to build the project, called VA4, on about 82 acres near Fredericksburg. The site will include three large two-story buildings designed to handle cloud computing, online services and artificial intelligence systems.
Once complete, the new campus will add 192 megawatts of capacity and bring Vantage’s total Virginia footprint to 782 megawatts. The company says it has invested about $8 billion across the commonwealth so far.
Construction is expected to support around 1,100 temporary jobs and create 50 permanent positions once operations begin. The first building is set to open in late 2027, with more coming online through 2028.
The company says the new campus will be built to LEED Silver standards and use a closed-loop cooling system designed to cut water use. It will also include liquid-to-liquid cooling equipment capable of handling all IT workloads efficiently.
“Thanks to companies like Vantage, Virginia is leading the world into a future powered by the limitless possibilities of artificial intelligence. With this $2 billion investment, Vantage is paving the way for a stronger Stafford County and a stronger Virginia,” Gov. Glenn Youngkin said in a statement.
Dana Adams, who leads Vantage’s North American operations, said Virginia has been “a cornerstone” of the company’s growth since 2017 and that the Fredericksburg region is becoming “a meaningful digital hub.”
Recent market data from DC Byte shows how much growth has shifted outside Loudoun County. In 2019, data center capacity outside Loudoun was about 2,300 megawatts. By 2024, that number climbed to more than 29,000 megawatts, with much of the expansion happening in Stafford, Spotsylvania and Culpeper counties, where there is more land and available power.
The new Vantage site will sit just over an hour south of the company’s existing Loudoun County campuses.