Quantum Leap Data Center/ Fisk University, Nashville, Tennessee

Fisk University wants to build a data center that could draw 30 megawatts of power on its North Nashville campus in Davidson County, Tennessee, part of a $400 million plan called Quantum Leap, but a citywide moratorium on data center permits blocks new applications through December 1, 2026. The historically Black university announced the 100,000-square-foot Innovation Center, with a 70,000-square-foot data center shell, in May 2026, and has not yet named the partner that would run it. Fisk says it "strongly supports efforts to regulate" data centers in Davidson County.

The five-acre site was once an athletics track, just west of Johnson Gymnasium at 17th Avenue North and Herman Street, a few blocks from Jefferson Street. Alumnus Winston Wright noted it sits right next to the Andrew Jackson Commons affordable housing development. Don Hardin, who is managing the project for Fisk, said Nashville Electric Service assured the university the facility would not overburden the area's power or raise residential bills, would use closed-loop cooling, and would use about as much water as 10 households.

Neighbors and alumni pushed back quickly. "It could mean higher electric bills, unsafe drinking water, pollution and whatever else, and they're not even talking to the community about it," said Kaylynn Mourning, a North Nashville mother who circulated a petition against the plan. At a protest outside the campus gates on June 10, 2026, alumnus and public health expert Winston Wellington Wright said, "We are standing in a ZIP code that consistently ranks within the top three for the highest rates of asthma prevalence and emergency-department-related visits across the city."

State Rep. Justin Jones, a 2017 Fisk graduate, told the protest: "If this project of AI data centers is not good for a zoo, then it's not good to build out of HBCUs, not good to build in the heart of a Black community." Nashville NAACP president Timothy Hughes asked Fisk to be more transparent, and a petition against the plan had gathered more than 6,000 signatures.

Fisk said in June it "is aware of the proliferation of environmentally harmful data centers that have created issues in the communities where they exist" and has taken a "do no harm" approach. It told the Nashville Scene it is "in the process of identifying our partner for the Innovation Center."

The Fisk plan, and a DC Blox data center proposed next to the Nashville Zoo, drove the city's response. On July 21, 2026, the Metro Council unanimously passed zoning rules for data centers, with distance requirements from schools and other sensitive places, environmental limits, restrictions on on-site power generation and noise, and a ban on the largest data centers. It also passed a moratorium on new data center permits that runs through December 1, 2026.

In August the council voted 27-5 to let city attorneys begin eminent domain proceedings for the site next to the zoo, which DC Blox had bought for $23 million. Metro Water Services requires a capacity analysis for any development using more than 3,500 gallons of water a day, and Fisk still needs approval from the Nashville Metropolitan Planning Commission.

Metro departments were preparing more data center recommendations in August under an executive order from Mayor Freddie O'Connell, and Councilmember Courtney Johnston extended the moratorium to December 1 so the council could weigh further rules based on that review.