Project Green Mountain Data Center, Archbald Borough, Pennsylvania

Archbald Borough Council's hearings on Project Green Mountain, a seven-building data center campus that Green Mountain 6 LLC wants to build at the Stavola Quarry in Archbald, Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania, resume on September 30, 2026, after a three-month pause. It will be the fourth conditional use hearing on the L-shaped, nearly 271-acre campus east of the Casey Highway, and the process ends with council voting to approve or deny it.

It is one of six data center campuses proposed in Archbald, amounting to 51 buildings, and six more are proposed elsewhere in Lackawanna County, in Clifton and Covington townships, Dickson City, Jessup, Olyphant and Ransom Township.

The application, filed January 26, calls for seven two-story data centers, each with a 138,000-square-foot footprint and 65 feet tall, drawing a projected 525 megawatts of power, or 75 megawatts per building. Cooling would be a closed loop of water and glycol, and the campus would take up to 14,000 gallons of water a day from Pennsylvania American Water for sinks and toilets.

For outages it would have 196 diesel generators, each with a tank of up to 10,000 gallons, for 1.96 million gallons of diesel on site. The developer has offered Archbald a $2.25 million community benefits agreement: $1 million on signing and $250,000 for each of the first five data centers when they get temporary occupancy permits.

Who is behind it has been a question from the start. The application named only a limited liability company, but during the first hearing in March a presenter's shared screen showed a file directory that included “Western Hospitality,” appearing to link the project to Western Hospitality Partners, which first proposed Archbald's Project Gravity before selling that site to Corscale in December 2025. Green Mountain also proposes seven data centers with 138,000-square-foot footprints.

“Project Green Mountain is a wholly and independently owned entity. Our standalone business is exclusively focused on the proposed project,” said Nicole Schomburg of FTI Consulting.

Noise has been the sharpest issue. The developer's sound study found the campus would stay under Archbald's 55-decibel residential daytime limit even with all 196 generators running, but Justin Richards, attorney for members of Stop Archbald Data Centers, said the predictions were “at the very margin,” equal to the maximum at some homes.

Asked whether any comparable campus had a completed post-construction sound study, the developer's acoustics engineer said, “As far as I know, nothing we have done this process for has been constructed.” More than 300 people, many in yellow-and-black “No Data Centers” shirts, packed the first hearing.

Green Mountain is the only Archbald campus on the side of the Casey Highway away from homes, which is one of the main requests of residents who oppose the borough's data center standards. Council amended its zoning in November 2025 to regulate data centers, putting an overlay on the quarry site that allows them as conditional uses.

After the developer finishes its testimony, the borough and opponents can present their own experts, followed by public comment. Archbald Borough Council then has 45 days to vote and issue a written decision. The next hearing is at 5 p.m. on September 30 at Valley View High School, 1 Columbus Drive.