Karis Critical Data Center, Merrillville, Indiana

Karis Critical's proposed data center campus on 101st Avenue in Merrillville, Lake County, Indiana, has its zoning: the Merrillville Town Council voted 7-0 in September 2024 to allow a data center on the 180-acre site east of Deep River County Park. The campus could total nine buildings, each costing $100 million, and no timeline or end customer has been named. The town's Data Center Citizen Advisory Committee, nine residents plus town officials and development professionals, endorsed the proposal.

Town council president Rick Bella said of the committee that "The preparation and thoughtful participation they brought to the discussion were invaluable." Plan commission member Brian Dering estimated about $1 million in annual property tax revenue for each building, and said the impact on town services would be small. Councilman Shawn Pettit called it "a low impact/high reward development."

Power is the open question: Karis has been working to make sure it can get enough from NIPSCO, and the existing transmission lines can serve only the first two buildings, with more needed for all nine.

It is one of three. Province Group of Newport Beach plans up to $500 million on a million square foot technology park near Colorado Street and Harms Road; Wylie Capital of Chicago plans 1.2 million square feet at Broadway, 93rd Avenue and Georgia Street for about $600 million and up to 200 jobs; and Karis Critical plans up to $900 million on 180 acres at 101st Avenue. A thousand housing units are being built at Liberty Estates for the workers.

Bella said the three together were "a huge boon to the tax base of course once these buildings are totally finished and operational", and Stephen Muenstermann of the town's data center advisory board said the $2 billion of direct investment "could end up having an $8 billion economic impact."

The town has since grown more cautious about new proposals: the Merrillville Town Council placed a one-year moratorium on new data center project approvals from June 1, 2026, through May 31, 2027, to give officials time to study impacts, after four separate developers approached the town. In July 2026 the council voted unanimously to extend the moratorium by six months, to January 1, 2028. Lake County has also limited where data centers can be zoned countywide since August 12, 2025. Karis Critical's zoning was already approved before either measure took effect, and no construction date has been announced.