By Mike Tony
Charleston Gazette-Mail
Editor’s note: This report was supported by the Pulitzer Center and is part of a Gazette-Mail series on drinking water quality in West Virginia.
Jamie Jacobs and her husband split time between Morgantown and the Canaan Valley. They planned a move to the latter full-time.
“[Then] this whole Fundamental Data thing came in,” Jacobs said. “So we’re kind of on hold with that.”
Jacobs was talking about the plan by Purcellville, Virginia-based Fundamental Data LLC to build and operate a gas turbine-powered facility in Tucker County, just downwind from her, expected to be a large-scale data center operation with vast diesel tank storage and the source of a significant increase in air pollution.
Fundamental Data, which has not responded to requests for comment, has been quiet about its plans for the facility, for which the West Virginia Department of Environmental Proection approved an air quality permit in August, despite fervent community opposition.
The company has redacted air emissions-related information throughout its permit application, prompting community and environmental advocates to file an unresolved appeal of the permit approval.
Read the rest of the story at the Weekend Gazette-Mail