HomeMy WebLinkAbout2026-09-02 Jenn Eng Support TestimonyFrom: jennifer eng
To: Planning WPC Testimony
Subject: Testimony in Support of Amending Bill 170 — Hyperscale Data Center Definition
Date: Wednesday, September 2, 2026 5:34:36 AM
To: Hawaiʻi County Council
From: Jenn Eng, Hilo Re: Bill 170 — SUPPORT for the objective 20-megawatt hyperscale data center definition
Aloha mai kākou Chair and Council Members,
My name is Jenn Eng, and I’m a homeowner in Hilo. I live on a property next door to my grandmother and mother and who were born and bred here in Hilo.
I’m submitting this testimony in strong support of amending Bill 170 to replace its current language — “industrial-scale operation” and “beyond that typically accessory or incidental to
office, commercial, or public institutional uses” — with the objective, physical-criteria definition being proposed:
“Hyperscale data center means any facility or campus of facilities whose primary purpose is the housing, operation, or co-location of computer servers, networking equipment, and
associated cooling, power, and support infrastructure… and which requires or is designed to require 20 megawatts or more of electrical capacity at full build-out…”
I urge the Council to adopt this specific language. Why this matters to me:
The current wording is vague enough that a well-resourced developer’s attorney could argue almost any large facility isn’t really “industrial-scale,” or that server infrastructure is merely
“incidental” to some other stated use. That kind of subjective language doesn’t protect anyone — it just becomes a legal argument for whoever can afford the best lawyer. A clear, physical
20-megawatt threshold can’t be argued around the same way. It gives the county something concrete to enforce and gives residents like me something concrete to understand.
I say this as someone who feels the cost of electricity directly, every month, in my own home. My electric bill on our Hilo property runs about $330 a month — and that’s without a single
hyperscale facility anywhere near us. Grandma’s bill runs even higher. Hawaiʻi already has the highest electricity rates in the country. A modern AI-scale data center can draw as much
power as 100,000 homes or more. I don’t have any confidence that a facility like that, sited here, leaves rates where they are for the rest of us.
Right now, in order to even afford continuing to live here on this multi generation property, we rent rooms out of our primary residence to make ends meet. Currently our property isn’t
generating rental income — we are between renters. The full weight of that bill falls on us as homeowners, not as a business. That’s the reality for a lot of families here: we’re not landlords
cushioned by rental income, we’re just trying to keep our own home affordable on one electric bill, one water bill, one household budget. Any policy that lets a massive new electricity and
water user get classified its way around meaningful review puts that basic affordability further out of reach for people like me.
Water is just as real a concern. These facilities are typically cooled with enormous volumes of fresh water — even a modest 20–50 megawatt facility using conventional cooling can require
millions of gallons a day. Hawaiʻi Island’s freshwater supply is already limited, and our household infrastructure is not built to absorb that kind of new, concentrated demand.
This land has been in my family for generations and it sits next to where my 98 year old grandmother still lives. I don’t want to see the resources our family and community depend on
quietly strained by a facility that was able to talk its way out of being defined as what it actually is.
I ask the Council to adopt the 20-megawatt objective definition as proposed, so that any future large-scale data center proposal in Hawaiʻi County is reviewed honestly, on its actual footprint
— not on how cleverly it can be described. Mahalo for your time and consideration.
Jenn Eng 65 Malama Place
Hilo, Hawaiʻi 96720