Switch Data Center, Cartersville, Georgia

Switch, the Las Vegas data center company, is building its Keep 2.0 Atlanta North campus on 126 acres south of Old Alabama Road and Bates Road in Cartersville, Bartow County, Georgia, running to the Paulding County line. Switch plans to invest $772 million in the data center campus, with a first phase due in the second quarter of 2026 and build-out continuing to 2046. The first phase is a single data center building about 1,620 feet long, with driveways, detention ponds and an electrical substation.

The Cartersville City Council created a new technology zoning district for the project and, at Switch's request, voted unanimously in November 2023 to rezone the 1,946 undeveloped acres left in the Carter Grove Planned Development to it. The land had been meant for later phases of the Carter Grove neighborhood, planned in the early 2000s for as many as 2,500 homes, of which about 400 lots exist. The filing put annual local tax revenue at $15 million.

Paulding County residents objected to a data center so close to homes. "This area is zoned as residential and should stay residential," Vicki Cox wrote to the city planner, citing frequent power outages nearby and "the noise and the environmental impact, as well as ongoing traffic nightmares." Mayor Matt Santini said Switch offered buffers twice the size the city usually requires, and Switch's local counsel, Brandon Bowen, said the campus would not use Carter Grove Boulevard for access. Officials say Switch's cooling system recycles water rather than relying on continuous withdrawals.

Bartow County officials have welcomed data centers. "It’s basically a warehouse with computers," said County Administrator Peter Olson, who hopes data center revenue could one day eliminate property taxes. In July 2026 Sole Commissioner Steve Taylor signed an amendment to the county's data center ordinance requiring each data center to provide its own power source, use a closed-loop water system, obey a strict noise ordinance and turn lights off at 9 p.m. A separate proposed data center in the Etowah Valley Historic District has drawn protests and petitions, and resident Marty Knight, who leads the opposition, said: "I don’t know anybody who wants a data center." "I want to see a moratorium," said Bella Bautista, a candidate for Georgia House District 14.

Switch has said it will keep building the campus in phases through 2046. Olson says at least three more data centers are approved or proposed elsewhere in Bartow County, and the Etowah Valley site would need a rezoning before a data center could be built there. As of August 2026, the campus was under construction.