Hyperscale Data Center Threat Hillsborough County, Florida

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 A 1,000-acre site in Dover, Florida, sitting inside Hillsborough County's urban service boundary just east of Tampa is being actively marketed to hyperscale data center developers, institutional investors, and large-scale industrial users. The property, known as University Energy Park at 4145 East State Road 60, is one of the largest remaining undeveloped tracts inside the county's urban service area, and its offering memorandum explicitly pitches it for "hyperscale and multi-tenant deployments" supporting "cloud, AI, and enterprise workloads."

Residents in Fish Hawk, Lithia, Valrico, Brandon, Dover, and surrounding communities deserve to know this is happening and what it could mean for their water, their air, their roads, and their quality of life.

University Energy Park is a roughly 1,000-acre former phosphate mining site bordered by State Road 60 to the north, South Dover Road to the west, Turkey Creek Road to the east, and Durant Road to the south. The property sits between Brandon and Plant City in the I-4 growth corridor of eastern Hillsborough County.

The site has a complicated history. During the 1950s it operated as the Sydney Phosphate Mine. In the 1970s, Hillsborough County used portions of the former mining site for liquid waste disposal activity that resulted in a 9.47-acre EPA Superfund site still under active groundwater monitoring today, with 33 monitoring wells tracking contamination including benzene, vinyl chloride, and 1,4-Dioxane all classified as probable or known human carcinogens.

In 2010, Hillsborough County commissioners approved the land for use as an "Energy Industrial Park." The property has since been rebranded as the Energy Innovation Park (EIP), and most recently as University Energy Park, the name now used in its commercial real estate marketing materials.

A commercial real estate offering memorandum  a formal marketing document used to attract buyers and tenants  was publicly circulated through a commercial real estate platform pitching University Energy Park specifically to data center and technology users.

The document contains language that makes the intended use clear:

• It references "hyperscale and multi-tenant deployments" and connectivity infrastructure "critical for cloud, AI, and enterprise workloads"
• It highlights multiple long-haul fiber providers along the SR-60 and CSX corridor including Arelion, T-Mobile, Uniti, Windstream, and Zayo, the kind of backbone fiber connectivity that hyperscale data centers require
• It notes that TECO has confirmed a power pathway to the site, with high-voltage transmission infrastructure adjacent to the property and an established process for securing large-load capacity
• It highlights an 18-inch high-pressure natural gas transmission line running through the property as a "meaningful advantage for large-load users requiring redundancy and energy flexibility" standard language used in data center site pitches
• It includes a dedicated Technology Lead broker based in Houston, Texas  one of the country's largest data center markets
• It markets 6.1 million square feet of entitled industrial space as a "next generation industrial and logistics development platform" suited for "advanced manufacturing, commercial use, and global logistics" and explicitly lists data center as an approved conceptual use

It is worth noting that earlier versions of the marketing materials contained more explicit hyperscale data center language that has since been quietly removed. The infrastructure pitch and the broker team remain unchanged.

A hyperscale data center is an industrial-scale facility housing tens of thousands of computer servers that power artificial intelligence applications, cloud computing, and data storage for major technology companies like Amazon, Google, Microsoft, and Meta.

These are not the small server rooms you might picture. A hyperscale facility can occupy hundreds of thousands to millions of square feet across multiple buildings. The University Energy Park site is entitled for up to 6.1 million square feet of industrial development, a buildout that would make it one of the largest development footprints in Florida.

For comparison:

• The controversial Fort Meade data center approved in Polk County in April 2026 covers 1,300 acres and 4.4 million square feet
• The proposed DeSoto County data center project has been described by its developers as "one of the largest data center projects on Earth"
• University Energy Park's 1,000 acres and 6.1 million square foot entitlement places it squarely in that same category

These facilities operate 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. They never stop.

This is the question that should concern every resident in Fish Hawk, Lithia, Valrico, Dover, Brandon, and the surrounding communities most.

Hyperscale data centers are among the largest water consumers of any industrial use. A large facility can consume between 3 and 5 million gallons of water per day  equivalent to the daily water consumption of a town of 30,000 to 50,000 people. Unlike residential or commercial water users, data centers run their cooling systems constantly and cannot reduce consumption during drought conditions.

The University Energy Park site sits in one of the most water-stressed regions in Florida. The Southwest Florida Water Management District (SWFWMD) has designated this area as part of the Northern Tampa Bay Water Use Caution Area, a formal regulatory designation that acknowledges the Floridan Aquifer here is already under significant stress from existing demand.

Residents of eastern Hillsborough County already understand what aquifer stress looks like in practice. During the freeze events of early 2025, strawberry farmers in the Plant City and Dover corridor ran irrigation systems through the night to protect their crops drawing so heavily on the local aquifer that private wells in surrounding neighborhoods ran dry. Hillsborough County had to set up emergency water stations so residents could access drinking water.

That was one night of agricultural irrigation.

A hyperscale data center would place the equivalent of that demand  or more on the same water system every single day, indefinitely.

Being connected to the public water system through Hillsborough County utilities does not solve this problem. The county's public water supply draws from the same Floridan Aquifer that feeds private wells. Connecting to public utilities does not create new water, it simply means the county becomes the intermediary drawing from an already stressed system.

The University Energy Park offering memorandum touts Hillsborough County's planned pipeline expansion adding approximately 65 million gallons per day of capacity. That expansion was planned to serve the estimated 350,000 new residents projected to move to Hillsborough County over the next 20 years  not to accommodate a hyperscale industrial water user on top of that residential growth.

The offering memorandum for University Energy Park acknowledges a 9.47-acre EPA Superfund area on the property and a broader 56.38-acre zone with active groundwater monitoring. The document describes the Superfund area as "less than 1% of the overall property" and says recent surface soil sampling did not identify contamination in shallow soils.

What the document does not say is that benzene, vinyl chloride, and 1,4-Dioxane have been detected in groundwater at the site. All three are either known or probable human carcinogens. The 33 monitoring wells exist precisely because these contaminants are present and must be tracked.

Heavy construction activity across a 1,000-acre site — excavation, grading, pile driving, stormwater system installation — creates significant risk of disturbing legacy contamination that is currently stable and contained. Changes to stormwater drainage patterns on a site of this scale can alter the flow of groundwater and accelerate the migration of contaminants through the aquifer.

University Energy Park sits within the Alafia River watershed. The Alafia River already carries legacy contamination from decades of phosphate mining activity throughout this corridor. Residents of Lithia, Fish Hawk, and Riverview who rely on the Alafia for recreation and who draw from wells in the watershed have a direct stake in what happens to groundwater at this site.

The University Energy Park site is approximately five miles north of Lithia, five to seven miles from Fish Hawk, and within ten miles of large portions of Valrico and Brandon. At that distance, direct noise and visual impacts are limited. But the concerns that matter most at this distance are:

Water: If you are on a private well in Lithia, Fish Hawk, or eastern Hillsborough County, you draw from the same Floridan Aquifer system that is already under stress. Cumulative demand from a hyperscale data center, even through the public utility system  increases pressure on a shared resource that has already proven vulnerable to high-demand events.

Stormwater and watershed: A 1,000-acre site transitioning from undeveloped land to an industrial campus dramatically increases impervious surface coverage. That means more stormwater runoff, faster and in greater volume, flowing into the Alafia River watershed drainage system. Eastern Hillsborough County already experiences significant flooding. Adding large-scale impervious coverage upstream compounds that risk.

Utility costs: Data centers impose enormous costs on local utility infrastructure  new substations, new transmission lines, expanded water and sewer capacity. Those infrastructure costs are frequently passed on to residential ratepayers through utility rate increases.

Traffic: A facility of this scale generates significant construction traffic over a multi-year build period  heavy equipment, concrete trucks, utility vehicles — on State Road 60 and connecting roads including Dover Road, Turkey Creek Road, and Lithia Pinecrest Road.

Rural character and land use trajectory: Once a 1,000-acre parcel in the I-4 corridor is developed as a hyperscale industrial campus, the development pressure on surrounding agricultural and rural land intensifies. The future of the eastern Hillsborough County corridor  and by extension, the communities of Lithia, Fish Hawk, Dover, and Valrico is shaped by what happens at this site.

It is important for residents to understand that development at the Energy Innovation Park has already begun moving through the county approval process — largely without public awareness.

In March 2026, the Hillsborough County Board of County Commissioners approved a rezoning modification in a 5-1 vote allowing up to 1,200 homes within "Pocket E" of the Energy Innovation Park property. Commissioner Donna Cameron Cepeda was the sole opposing vote.

The EIP land use category is also currently under active review by the Hillsborough County Planning Commission, with multiple public hearings required. This review process is ongoing and residents have the right to participate.

The full site's existing entitlements already permit up to 6.1 million square feet of heavy industrial uses — including data centers — without additional rezoning. That means certain development scenarios at this site may not require further commission approval before proceeding to permitting.

1. Monitor our Facebook and stay up to date here. 

2. Search HillsGovHubHillsborough County's public permit and application portal at hillsboroughcounty.org allows anyone to search by address for active applications, pre-application meetings, and permit submissions. Search "4145 State Road 60" regularly.

3. File a public records requestUnder Florida's Public Records Act (Chapter 119 of Florida Statutes), you have the right to request all correspondence, emails, and meeting notes between Hillsborough County Development Services and any party regarding the Energy Innovation Park or University Energy Park. Submit your request to the Hillsborough County Attorney's office.

4. Monitor SWFWMDThe Southwest Florida Water Management District must issue a consumptive use permit for any large-scale water withdrawal associated with this site. That process is public and subject to public comment. Visit swfwmd.state.fl.us and sign up for alerts in your area.

5. Contact all seven Hillsborough County CommissionersAll seven commissioners vote on land use matters affecting this site. Call and email each one and ask them directly: What is the current status of any development applications or pre-application discussions related to University Energy Park at 4145 East State Road 60? Is the county in any discussions with data center developers regarding this property?

6. Show upHillsborough County Board of County Commission meetings are held at the County Center at 601 East Kennedy Boulevard in Tampa. Planning Commission hearings are open to the public. Public comment matters — communities that organized and showed up early have successfully modified or stopped projects like this in other Florida counties.

Preserve Rural Lithia will continue to monitor the Energy Innovation Park / University Energy Park site and report on any new developments, permit applications, or commission agenda items as they arise.

If you have information about this site  documents, meeting notices, communications from developers or county staff please contact us preserverurallithia@gmail.com

This is our community. We have the right to know what is being planned here and the right to be heard before decisions are made.