Wicomico County Implements One-Year Freeze on New Data Center Projects

Capital Gazette confirmed the action alongside a separate moratorium adopted by the Town of Federalsburg. The pause is structured to permit county officials to evaluate environmental, energy, and land-use impacts before establishing appropriate zoning regulations for this use category.

Statutory Mechanics of the Pause

A moratorium operates as a temporary prohibition on the acceptance or approval of specified applications during a defined review window. The Wicomico measure applies to data center proposals for twelve months. Per reporting from Bay to Bay News, the Council cited the need to "ensure the health, safety and welfare" of local citizens as the operative rationale.

During the moratorium period, the County intends to:

• Assess environmental impacts, including water consumption, thermal discharge, and site runoff
• Evaluate projected energy demand against existing grid capacity and transmission constraints
• Conduct land-use compatibility studies, with emphasis on adjacency to residential zones, agricultural reserves, and designated growth corridors
• Draft zoning ordinance text amendments governing heavy industrial use conditions specific to data center facilities

The statutory basis for such a pause rests in the County's home rule authority to regulate land use within its jurisdictional boundaries. The operative ordinance — once published — will define the precise scope of permissible activity during the freeze period.

Adjacent Jurisdictional Activity

The Wicomico action is not isolated. The Southern Maryland Chronicle reports that the Calvert County Board of Commissioners scheduled a public hearing for August 18 on a proposed six-month moratorium. That measure follows the August 4 withdrawal by Amazon Web Services of a site plan application for a roughly 2,000-acre campus adjacent to the Calvert Cliffs Nuclear Power Plant — a project proposing approximately 2.46 million square feet of data center space and a 500-megawatt power demand. Calvert's proposed ordinance would pause new site plan approvals to permit adoption of updated zoning text amendments and heavy industrial use conditions.

The pattern indicates a regional regulatory posture: Eastern Shore counties are pausing application acceptance to retrofit zoning frameworks before further site plan submissions.

Items to Track

For practitioners, property owners, and residents monitoring land-use outcomes in Somerset County and adjacent jurisdictions:

• Publication of the full Wicomico moratorium ordinance text, effective date, and any exemptions for projects already in technical review
• Any companion resolution directing specific environmental or infrastructure studies, including consultant selection
• The outcome of the Calvert County August 18 hearing and the resulting ordinance's scope
• Whether Somerset County initiates parallel review of data center provisions under its current Comprehensive Plan framework
• The status of previously submitted — but unapproved — data center or heavy industrial site plans within Wicomico County, which may be subject to different treatment depending on application completeness dates

The moratoriums represent the formal phase of local regulatory response to data center siting pressure. The operative documents — not press statements — will govern what is permissible during the pause.