Microsoft has filed with the US Army Corps of Engineers to develop a new data center campus on 490 acres of land adjacent to its existing AVC17 data center campus in Mecklenburg County, Virginia.

The site sits south of Highway 58 and east of Panhandle Road, and the company says it will be able to utilize nearby existing data center infrastructure as part of the expansion.

What Is Being Built

The proposed campus will include three one-story data center buildings, access roads, an on-site electrical substation, and a water storage facility.

Microsoft plans to construct the campus in two phases, and the full approval and construction process is expected to take between four and five years. The company has not shared details about the size or capacity of the planned facilities.

Why Microsoft Says It Needs More Capacity

According to a document attached to the Army Corps of Engineers application, the new campus is needed to address what Microsoft describes as expanding customer demand for cloud platform services in the region.

The document cites increased teleworking capacities, cloud-based data storage and operating platforms, gaming, and contactless living behaviors as drivers of that demand.

Microsoft stated in the filing that its existing data centers within the southern Virginia Regional Network Group are outgrowing design capacity faster than originally anticipated.

The company attributed those capacity pressures specifically to the push for greater teleworking and cloud-based storage, noting that because of construction timelines, it is planning now for both existing capacity demand and future growth.

The filing described the data center design for the project as advanced and said it is expected to provide optimal operational efficiencies.

A County Already Dense With Microsoft Infrastructure

Mecklenburg County is already home to a number of Microsoft data centers, all located within the company's southern Virginia Regional Network Group.

Between 2022 and 2023, Microsoft filed for three separate data center campuses in the area. Those filings covered a 369-acre campus on land north of Butler Farm Road, a 132-acre site at 210 Tunstall Road that would include three buildings, and a 259-acre parcel at the Lakeside Commerce Park, also planned to house three buildings.

The company also maintains a longstanding campus in Boydton, within Mecklenburg County.

That campus was first announced in 2010 and built at a cost of nearly USD 500 million, a figure that was described at the time as the largest economic investment in Southern Virginia history. The Boydton campus was subsequently expanded in 2011, 2013, 2014, 2015, and 2016.

Microsoft's Cloud Presence in Virginia

Virginia holds significant strategic importance for Microsoft's cloud infrastructure. The company operates two Azure cloud regions in the state, designated East and East 2, as well as two government-dedicated zones known as US DoD East and US Gov Virginia.

Mecklenburg County's geographic position contributes to its appeal as a data center location, situated within an hour and a half of Richmond, Virginia, and Raleigh, North Carolina, and approximately two and a half hours from Norfolk, Virginia.

The latest filing adds to what is already a substantial and growing cluster of Microsoft infrastructure in the southern part of the state, reflecting the company's continued investment in the region as demand for cloud services shows no sign of abating.