Oakland University Data Center, Rochester, Michigan

On June 26, 2026 the Oakland University board of trustees in Rochester, Michigan, voted to advance a 20 to 26 megawatt data center on campus, seven votes in favor, with trustee Stefen J. Welch abstaining because he still had questions and was not ready to vote either way. The vote opens a year of due diligence with the developer Fairmount Properties, working with DTE Energy. President Ora Pescovitz told the meeting: "This is a project that we desperately need in order to sustain our current position and for us to see ourselves in the future."

Dozens of people, many of them students, held protest signs through the presentation. Cullen Black, president of the student congress, said: "Students resoundingly have said no [to the data center], and we're here to echo that statement." Megan L. Peiser, an associate professor of English and a member of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, accused the board of "ignoring native people's opposition to this data center" and told them "shame on you." The site, parking lot P37, lies next to the campus Native American heritage site on Anishinaabe ancestral land.

Ten percent of the computing capacity would serve the campus and the other 90 percent would go to partner companies, which is most of what the campus objection is about. The university says the building would take less than two percent of its land, and due diligence was expected to start in September or October 2026 before design and construction.

If the project passes due diligence it would move into design and then construction. Each of the three agreements with Fairmount, including the ground lease, runs through the university's board of trustees.