AWS Hilliard III (Scioto Darby) data center, Hilliard, Ohio

Amazon's third Hilliard data center campus stands on 142 acres at Scioto Darby Road and Interstate 270 in Franklin County, Ohio, where a 2022 plan calls for seven data center buildings and an American Electric Power substation. AEP Ohio wants to install 228 natural gas fuel cells on the site, a 72.9-megawatt power plant on about six acres to run the buildings. State law gives the Ohio Power Siting Board sole authority over a power plant that size, not the city of Hilliard.

The Ohio Power Siting Board's approval of the fuel cell plant took effect September 22, 2025, and AEP withdrew its request for a city hearing that October, cancelling a Planning and Zoning Commission hearing that had been set for November 13, 2025. Amazon holds a 15-year, 100 percent property tax abatement on the campus, granted in 2019, and City Councilman Les Carrier said the fuel cells were never part of that deal: "They changed our agreement. I certainly did not approve a tax abatement for a fuel cell operation."

Neighbors in the subdivision next door organized as Rise Up Hilliard. Resident Annette Singh told Signal Ohio: "I was unaware that putting in a data center meant putting in a mini gas power plant and all these other things with it." The Ohio EPA's air permit for the plant allows up to 1.45 million pounds of carbon dioxide a day, which the city compared to the output of 66,000 cars, and the campus also has 158 diesel backup generators.

Hilliard appealed the Ohio EPA permit, arguing it was issued without notice to the city, then withdrew that appeal in September 2026. "From the beginning, we knew this would be an uphill battle because state law intentionally gives local communities very limited authority over facilities like this," City Council President Emily Cole said, adding that withdrawing the appeal was not an endorsement. The city plans to test air quality once the fuel cells are running.