Massive data center with power plant planned for public land in Idaho
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Mark Dee, Idaho Statesman
BOISE (Idaho Statesman) — A Nevada company is eyeing more than 3,700 acres of public land in southern Ada County to build a 4-million-square-foot data center complex — as well as a new power plant to help electrify it.
Rhea Data, a subsidiary of Las Vegas-headquartered Arevia Power, has submitted an application to build a “multi-building data center” near Blacks Creek Reservoir on Kuna-Mora Road, a short drive east of where Meta opened its newest data center this month, Bureau of Land Management spokesperson Heather Tiel-Nelson told the Idaho Statesman on Monday morning.
The project is still in “very early stages,” Tiel-Nelson said, but the preliminary design also includes a natural-gas power plant, electrical infrastructure and rights of way spanning into Elmore County.
As proposed, it would be nearly 5.5 times larger than Meta’s nearby Kuna Data Center.
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The Washington Sun first reported the project on Sept. 18 as one of a dozen data centers sited on public land under consideration by the Trump administration. All told, the BLM is considering applications covering some 17,600 acres across Arizona, Idaho, Nevada, Oregon, Utah and Wyoming, according to public records of right-of-way proposals reviewed by the Sun.
Locally, Rhea’s application falls under the purview of the BLM’s Four Rivers Field Office. Four Rivers Field Manager Jarod Blades told the Statesman that the office first received an application for a “large-scale data center campus” in August 2025. BLM staff requested further information, which was provided in spring 2026.
There’s no timeline set yet for public comment on the plan. The office is in its “pre-planning phase,” Blades said, gathering information on the proposal and how it might affect existing uses nearby, including the reservoir, Black’s Creek Public Shooting Range and livestock grazing. It also needs to evaluate cultural impacts in concert with area tribes, Blades said, and set project milestone dates.
Blades plans to publish a “notice of intent” on the federal register before the end of the year, which will open the plan to public comment.
“We still have a long ways to go, that’s the takeaway,” he told the Statesman.
Meanwhile, the BLM has questions of its own. It is still asking for details about water demand, and how Rhea plans to cool the plant. (A “closed” system, like the one used down the road by Meta, reuses water to dissipate heat, and as a result requires far less than an “open” system that evaporates water off.)
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The campus’ power needs are still fuzzy, too.
Blades said the BLM is “holding back” information on electric demands while the design takes shape. Blades and Tiel-Nelson both said that the data center is “linked” to Arevia Power’s proposed Snake River Energy solar plan, which would generate a peak output of 400 megawatts on BLM land north of Twin Falls, the Capital Press reported last year.
Rhea’s plant would rely on “multiple power sources,” Blades said, and tie into Idaho Power’s grid. The gas plant would supplement the servers and “ensure continuity” during peak hours, Blades said.
Idaho Power is aware of the data center project, company spokesperson Sven Berg told the Statesman on Monday afternoon. Because it is “still preliminary,” it is not included in the utility’s forecast for future load demand, he said.
“Any project of this size and scope would require review and approval by the Idaho Public Utilities Commission, as well as extensive planning by Idaho Power to ensure we could serve the project safely and reliably without shifting costs to our existing customers,” Berg said.
Idaho Power is also developing a pair of gas-powered plants in southern Idaho. Berg said they are unrelated to Rhea’s data center proposal.
“As for how it would be powered, we’re too early in the analysis phase to know any details,” Berg told the Statesman.
Altogether, the site would span some 3,750 acres, Blades said — a 3,200-acre campus, plus another 550 acres of transmission and electrical wiring.
“Not every acre” of the area would be developed, he said, and the BLM is still considering how it might fit on site.
Further details could come out during the National Environmental Policy Act, or NEPA, review, Blades said.
“We’re anticipating it like everybody else,” he said, emphasizing the long road of public scrutiny ahead.
“This is an application the BLM is required by law to evaluate — it’s not a BLM proposal,” he said. “We evaluate them as they come in the door.”
The application comes amid backlash against data centers, which have a strong ally in President Donald Trump.
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A May Gallup poll found that seven in 10 Americans would be opposed to seeing a data center constructed in their area. A greater percentage of respondents would rather have a nuclear power plant nearby than a server farm, according to Gallup data.
On social media last week, Trump urged communities to “let Data Reign” in support of America’s “Golden Goose”: artificial intelligence.
“The only reason that communities throughout the U.S.A. should not want Data Centers is if they want to end up being backwards and poor,” he wrote on Truth Social. “If they want to be successful and rich, with far lower taxes and jobs all over the place, let Data Reign. The good news is that there are plenty of other places that want them. If we kill the Golden Goose, you will only have yourselves to blame.”
Citing the Washington Sun story, the Idaho Chapter of the Sierra Club condemned Rhea’s plan — and the Trump administration’s support of data centers on public land writ large.
“Our public lands in Idaho are not playgrounds for out-of-state tech companies,” Vienne Aberle, spokesperson for the Idaho Sierra Club, said in a statement. “They are for wildlife, clean water, and for public recreation. The lack of transparency from the Trump Administration is a clear attempt to block the public from engaging in the process, likely because of how unpopular public lands sell-offs are. Idahoans will not stand silently by, especially once the required environmental review processes begin.”
Lisa Young, director of the Idaho Chapter of the Sierra Club, called the proposal for Blacks Creek “unacceptable.”
“An additional data center with its own gas plant would wreck our local air quality and climate, not to mention the countless other impacts from a project like this,” Young wrote in a statement.
Earlier this month, Meta flipped the switch on a $1.2 billion data center of its own in nearby Kuna.
The parent company of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, Meta’s 750,000-square-foot server farm is its first in Idaho and 28th in the U.S.