The Durham County Board of Commissioners voted four to one on August 24, 2026 to adopt a nine month moratorium, with modifications. It covers the acceptance and processing of applications for new or expanded AI data centers. Durham County Board of Commissioners A moratorium is a temporary local law that tells county staff to stop taking in, reviewing and approving one whole class of applications for a set period of time. Durham’s pause runs until May 2027. WRAL More than 60 residents spoke at the public hearing before the vote. Durham County Board of Commissioners
The nine month measure follows a June vote that changed the county’s Unified Development Ordinance to allow a pause longer than the 60 day one the board passed in May. WRAL The Unified Development Ordinance is the county’s written rulebook for what can be built on which piece of land. County staff are now drafting AI data center standards to go into it, which is the work the pause was adopted to make room for. The county’s advance notice said the board would consider a moratorium with some exceptions, listed as agenda item 26-0437. Durham County Board of Commissioners
What state law asks of a pause like this
North Carolina’s moratorium statute, G.S. 160D-107, tells a county what its ordinance has to contain. Four things, and all of them at the time of adoption. A statement of the problems that made a pause necessary, and why the alternatives were not adequate. A statement of which approvals are caught. A termination date, with the reason that length is reasonably necessary. And the actions the county will take while the pause runs, with the schedule for them. N.C. Gen. Stat. 160D-107
The exemptions work differently, and the difference is the part a developer should hold onto. The statute does not tell the county to write carve outs into its ordinance. It says the moratorium does not apply at all, absent an imminent threat to public health or safety. That reaches a project holding a valid building permit. It reaches one whose special use permit application has been accepted as complete. It reaches development set out in an approved site specific vesting plan. It reaches development where substantial expenditures were already made in good faith reliance on a prior valid approval. And it reaches subdivision plats accepted for review before the hearing to adopt the moratorium was called. N.C. Gen. Stat. 160D-107 A project in one of those categories sits outside the pause by force of the statute, whatever the county’s own exemption list happens to say.
A site plan is the drawing a developer files showing where the buildings, the parking and the pipes will sit on a piece of land. The county approves it before anything is built. Vested rights are the protection a project earns once it gets far enough along. The owner is then judged by the rules that were in force when the approval came, rather than by rules the county writes afterward.
Durham has the fixed end date the statute calls for, and it has a work schedule. Staff told the board a preliminary draft of permanent rules could be ready by December, and that the adoption process could begin after the new year. They are studying facility size, electrical load, cooling technology, backup generator emissions and phasing standards. GovTech A preliminary draft could therefore be ready by December, with the adoption process potentially beginning after the new year. A developer who simply waits out the nine months does not come out into open ground, it comes out into a rulebook written while it waited.
Which projects can still move forward
A new AI data center under 100,000 square feet can still be approved if it uses a closed loop cooling system or similar technology that cuts water use. The Duke Chronicle In a closed loop system the same water keeps circulating through the building and is reused, instead of evaporating away and being replaced from the public supply. The board’s amendments that night also added backup generator conditions for applicants. GovTech Exempt buildings cannot run their backup power on diesel, and an amendment extended that same condition to expansions of existing facilities, which the draft had left uncovered. Hey Durham
Existing AI data centers keep operating, and they may be able to expand within the constraints the ordinance sets. The Duke Chronicle Educational institutions, medical facilities and similar uses are excepted, matching the language the Durham City Council adopted. Duke University’s project near Central Campus is not blocked, because it was approved before the moratorium passed and it falls inside the exception for educational use. That is the whole test in one example. Approval already granted, plus an excepted use, equals a project that keeps moving.
The exemptions were the fight. A Research Triangle Park speaker asked the board to pass the moratorium as written, on behalf of the 55,000 employees and 400 companies in the park. Other speakers asked for a 32 month pause with no exemptions at all. ABC11
| What changed | Before | After |
|---|---|---|
| Length of the pause | 60-day pause adopted in May 2026, and a June UDO amendment allowed a longer one | Nine-month moratorium running until May 2027 |
| New or expanded AI data center applications | Accepted and processed by the county | Acceptance, processing and approval halted, subject to the listed exemptions |
| Expansions of existing facilities under Section 4D | Draft imposed no cooling or backup power conditions on expansions | Section 4A water-saving cooling and non-diesel backup conditions now apply |
| Applicant disclosure for exemptions | Not required in the draft ordinance | Written certification of electrical load, cooling fluid and backup fuel, as public record |
| Permanent county standards | No data-center-specific Unified Development Ordinance standards adopted | Staff drafting UDO language, preliminary draft possible by December |
| Alignment with City of Durham | City moratorium adopted in June, county pause shorter | County timeline matched to the city’s, ending May 2027, enabling coordination |
What an exempt applicant has to put in writing
A developer claiming an exemption must certify in writing its expected connected electrical load, its cooling system type and working fluid, and its backup generation fuel type, and that certification becomes a public record. Hey Durham Connected electrical load is the amount of electric power the building expects to draw from the grid once it is running. That motion passed four to one, with Commissioner Michelle Burton against it. Anything an applicant writes down now can be read back to it in December, when the same staff who collect these forms are drafting the permanent rules.
Rania Masri of the North Carolina Environmental Justice Network told the board that even a 100,000 square foot AI data center can use 20 to 100 megawatts of electricity. She said high density AI data centers use 50 to more than 100 megawatts. GovTech A megawatt is one million watts of electric power. Two buildings can both sit under the county’s square footage line and still differ fivefold in what they pull off the grid. The exemption covers some enterprise and small scale facilities of up to 100,000 square feet. County staff say they are examining facility size, electrical load, cooling technology, backup generator emissions and phasing standards while drafting the permanent regulations.
Do pending applications escape the pause?
A memo that went with the moratorium said at least two AI data center projects, planned to be under 100,000 square feet, are close to submitting development applications. The Duke Chronicle A plan that is close to submission has not yet been filed, so the at least two projects described in the memo had not submitted development applications before the Monday vote. Developer ECO TIP West LLC sued Chatham County this year over an $11 million project, pleading vested property rights that the county’s conduct was affecting. the complaint That is the same argument any Durham applicant caught mid filing would make, and the date stamped on the application is what would decide it.
Vice Chair Nida Allam told the board that Section 3.2 of the ordinance describes keeping development rights from vesting under rules that do not address the impacts of these uses. Section 4, she said, lets some of those same uses proceed under exactly those rules. Hey Durham Allam argued that a building approved during the pause under today’s rulebook can later claim it is governed by today’s rulebook. She said Section 3.2 of the ordinance was written to prevent that.
The state tax break on electricity is already gone
North Carolina has repealed the sales and use tax exemption on electricity sold for use at what the statute calls Certified Datacenters. Session Law 2026-41 did it, the repeal took effect on July 7, 2026, and by the terms of Session Law 2026-42 it reached the first billing period starting on or after August 6. Electricity for those sites now carries the combined general rate. North Carolina Department of Revenue So a Durham project is not waiting for that change to arrive. It is already paying it, and a nine month pause is nine months of paying it before the site earns anything. Orange, Chatham and Cumberland counties and the City of Durham have adopted their own pauses, so moving a blocked project one county over is not a simple fix. ABC11 The board’s next regular session is scheduled for Monday, September 14, 2026. Durham County Board of Commissioners
Tomorrow’s topic
The Delaware law requiring AI data centers to procure clean energy.