Developer Planning 2M SF Data Center Near Microsoft's Campus South Of Atlanta
An Atlanta developer is planning a massive data center campus south of Downtown Atlanta dubbed “Project Peach.”
Strategic Real Estate Partners is seeking permission to develop a $1B, 2.1M SF data center campus on 320 acres at 300 Johnston Circle in the city of Palmetto in Fulton County. The developer filed a Development of Regional Impact application this week with the Georgia Department of Community Affairs, which approves projects expected to affect regional infrastructure.
The site, 300 Johnston Circle, is 4 miles from Microsoft’s nearly $500M Azure data center campus and its recent acquisition of additional contiguous land.
Strategic plans to develop eight data center buildings in total by 2036, according to the application. Once operational, Strategic projects the campus will add $3M in annual local tax revenues.
It is unclear if Strategic has a data center operator lined up to operate the buildings once complete.
Strategic partner John Young, who is listed on the application, declined to comment. Palmetto Mayor Teresa Thomas-Smith didn't return calls seeking comment.
The developer's proposal is just the latest put forward in Metro Atlanta’s booming data center market. Developers have more than doubled the data center capacity in the region since 2020, CBRE reported. Developers were underway with more than 1,200 megawatts of data center capacity in the first half of the year, according to CBRE, a 76% increase from the same time last year.
Metro Atlanta is on track to become the second-largest data center market in the U.S. behind Northern Virginia, per CBRE. But that kind of growth has created a backlash.
This past summer, the City of Atlanta instituted a data center development ban on sites surrounding the Atlanta BeltLine, the 22-mile pedestrian path that has become a magnet for new and revitalized real estate projects. And in May, the state legislature passed a bill to pause a sales and use tax break until 2026, which was vetoed by Gov. Brian Kemp.
