Google Henderson data center, Henderson, Nevada

Google's data center at 560 West Warm Springs Road in Henderson, in Clark County, Nevada, used 352 million gallons of water in 2024, about what 2,700 average households get through in a year. It is the only data center in Henderson. Southern Nevada banned evaporative cooling for new data centers in 2023, because the water authority cannot recycle what that method consumes; this site opened in 2020 and uses it. The Nevada Independent describes it as one of the state's thirstiest.

In June 2026 Henderson's council voted to consider a 180 day moratorium on new data centers, with a final decision set for July 21. Mayor Michelle Romero, who proposed it, explained her reasoning simply: "I'm not an IT expert, I'm not a data center expert." On the night the council rejected the pause and told staff to rewrite the standards instead, so that any future data center would need an individually negotiated development agreement with the city. City attorney Nicholas Vaskov said a moratorium "is temporary to some degree, they are only defensible for up to a certain point, usually that's up to 12 to 18 months." About 20 residents spoke, on energy use, noise and the environment. "... it alarms me how little time we've been given to prepare the proper regulations to protect people," said resident Drake York.

What is queuing behind that decision is large. NV Energy has had requests to serve 39 proposed data center projects drawing 16,530 megawatts between them, against a state peak load of 8,241 megawatts. A 300 acre data center campus proposed by Trammell Crow has already been approved in eastern Henderson under a conditional use permit, and Clark County has 43 data centers in all. John Entsminger, who runs the Southern Nevada Water Authority, told lawmakers in March that data centers "can be built without consuming any more water." Tray Abney of the Nevada Data Center Alliance put the industry's view of the argument: "For some reason, data centers are the boogeyman of the day."

Google bought the 64 acre site on Warm Springs Road for $19 million through an entity called Jasmine Development LLC. The company said it would invest at least $600 million over 20 years, and later said it planned to invest more than $400 million in Nevada in a single year for its cloud and data center infrastructure. The state gave a $25 million tax abatement, and Google said it would hire 50 employees within five years at an average salary of $65,000.

Any future data center in Henderson will now need an individually negotiated development agreement with the city, a route the Sierra Club said "falls far short of the temporary pause residents requested."