"Under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, data center projects in rural areas could be eligible for major tax benefits starting next year. Some hyperscalers do not seem eager to take the free cash."
"On January 1, a new tax windfall will kick in that could benefit scores of rural data center projects—all thanks to the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
Starting next year, projects sited in tracts of rural land across the country will be newly eligible for a set of specific corporate tax benefits under a program expanded by the bill. The new rules “may significantly lower barriers for large-scale, capital-intensive projects in rural areas—most notably hyperscale data centers,” said a statement from Ways and Means Committee chair Jason Smith last year. “The economic case for building data centers in designated rural opportunity zones becomes far more compelling” with the new program, he continued.
But experts warn that the results for rural communities could be mixed."
