May 9, 2026
Shark Tank's Kevin O'Leary has been busy lately with a cameo in the movie, Marty Supreme, and his bid to build a hyperscale data center in Utah — three times the size of Manhattan (1) that will consume more than twice the electricity currently (2) used by the entire state. Hundreds of outraged residents flocked a local gym and roared "Shame! Shame! Shame" (3) as the Box Elder County commissioners approved Mr. Wonderful's project this week.
Box Elder County has a population of approximately 65,000 (4) and is home to the Great Salt Lake, the largest saltwater lake (5) in the Western Hemisphere.
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O'Leary told Fox (6) last month that "we need to compete with China. We need AI computing power and so where do you put that? You put that in AI data centers." He said the Chinese are building "10x the power of what we are" and "we've been stalled with permitting problems across the country." Utah stepped up, having the land, a pipeline running through the land and a designation that can accelerate permitting, he added.
The celebrity Shark admitted that most people don't like data centers because when they tap into the grid, electrical costs skyrocket for the local community.
However, he further explained in the interview (7) that the Utah site will generate its own energy using a nearby natural gas pipeline, allowing it to operate independently while also potentially supplying excess power back to the grid.
Local outcry, country wide
Locals are concerned about pollution, noise, drought strain, electricity prices going up, local water supply still affected, air quality issues and the eyesore of a sprawling data center in a small town. The New York Post (8) article shared that residents described a rushed approval process that they had little say over or didn't consent to.
O'Leary took to X on Tuesday, dismissing them as pseudo protestors or AI. "We think over 90% of the protesters are actually not people that live in Utah or Box Elder County. They're being bussed in," he stated in a video (9).
"If you look at the social media around the Utah proposal, much of it is AI," O'Leary added. The comments section of that video is telling with a lot of pushback. People are protesting across the country. On Wednesday (10), residents turned up at a community meeting in Kenilworth, New Jersey — 17 miles from New York City — with cowbells and whistles to fight a data center project in progress.
O'Leary has stated that people want AI and you don't get AI without data centers. According to the Post (11), one Utah State University physicist estimated the project could raise the state's greenhouse gas emissions by roughly 50%.
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Other big names like Mark Zuckerberg (12) are buying up big land to power their AI prophecies. Bill Gates (13) is one of the largest private owners of U.S. farmland, roughly 275,000 acres across various states.
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Big data's benefits. What's the big deal?
Utah's Military Installation Development Authority (MIDA) approved a sharply reduced energy tax rate of 0.5% for the project — far below the 6% rate it was authorized to charge, according to the Post (14).
The companies who are building these centers say their developments can generate economic growth and jobs, and a number of tech executives recently signed on to a White House-sponsored pledge (15) aimed at limiting their effect on residential electric bills.
While data centers can bring short-term construction work, few may provide permanent jobs to locals long-term. In the study, Subsidizing the Cloud (16), the researchers found no clear evidence that data centers stimulate local tech-related employment growth.
Hundreds (17) of hyperscale facilities are in the works across the U.S. Pay attention to what's happening in your county and state, as data centers will impact the economy and environment.
Article Sources
We rely only on vetted sources and credible third-party reporting. For details, see our ethics and guidelines.
Fox News (1),(6),(7); New York Post (2),(8),(11),(14); TikTok (3); Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (4); Utah.com (5); X (9); ABC7 New York (10); Sherwood News (12); Yahoo Finance (13); The White House (15); SSRN (16); Consumer Reports (17)
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Amanda Smith is an Australian freelance journalist and writer based in the New York City area who reports on culture/society, technology, and health.
