WED AM News: New details revealed for Meta’s Beaver Dam data center; Evers urging members of Congress to protect state’s legal hemp industry

March 4, 2026

— Meta’s new Beaver Dam data center could use up to 220 megawatts of power, according to newly unredacted portions of a proposed service contract with Alliant Energy.

That’s less than other hyperscale data center campuses under construction in Wisconsin but well beyond the residential power needs of most of the state’s cities.

For reference, Alliant’s West Riverside Energy Center outside Beloit had an output of 730 megawatts when it began service in 2020, enough to power more than 550,000 homes.

For comparison, 220 megawatts could power over 165,000 homes, based on those same figures.

Madison has around 134,000 housing units, according to the 2024 American Community Survey’s 5-year estimates; Beaver Dam had 7,831, according to the same data set.

Robert Orozco, an artificial intelligence entrepreneur and executive-in-residence at UW-Whitewater, wrote in a text message yesterday that the Beaver Dam data center’s power demand would “dwarf most small cities in Wisconsin.”

“The fact that they hid it means they already anticipated pushback,” he wrote.

Still, the Beaver Dam facility would consume a fraction of the power needed by the state’s largest data center projects.

The first phase of Microsoft’s data center campus in Mount Pleasant is expected to use around 450 megawatts of power, while Vantage’s Port Washington campus could use up to 3.5 gigawatts – or 3,500 megawatts – of power.

Alliant agreed in a hearing last week to unredact portions of its proposed service contract after environmental and consumer advocate groups complained about the extent of the redactions to the utility’s application.

Its application and proposed electric service agreement were posted on the PSC’s online docket at 4 p.m. Friday.

Other newly available information include the length of the proposed service contract – 10 years – as well as provisions that would allow Alliant to recoup its infrastructure and service costs if the data center were to be canceled or use less power than anticipated, though specific figures associated with those provisions remain redacted.

Alliant spokesperson Cindy Tomlinson said the utility was committed to having large energy users like Meta pay for new infrastructure investments built to serve them and that this would keep costs lower for other ratepayers in the long term.

Citizens Utility Board Executive Director Tom Content said he “appreciated the transparency” the latest filing offered, given the considerable public interest in the case.

However, he said CUB would like to see more ratepayer protections in the agreement, like a stronger termination charge or a 15- or 20-year service contract to keep Meta on the hook for utility costs amid a volatile tech market.

Content noted facilities in other states have signed 15-year contracts for utility service.

PSC staff are reviewing the refiled application and electric service agreement, a spokesperson wrote in an email, after which regulators will either accept the new filings or call for more information to be made public.

— Gov. Tony Evers is urging members of the state’s congressional delegation to take “immediate” action to protect the state’s hemp industry.

The Dem guv last week sent a letter to Wisconsin members of Congress raising concerns about a new federal law, which is expected to ban the sale of most hemp products in the country starting in November. It was included in a much larger bill package to reopen the federal government last year.

He said hemp-derived products support a “growing sector of legitimate businesses” across the state, which collectively employ nearly 3,500 people and have a $700 million economic impact.

Under the new federal definition setting the legal limit of THC in hemp-derived products at 0.4 milligrams per container, many of the products these businesses sell would “would be reclassified in a manner that effectively eliminates” existing business models, Evers wrote. This would result in business closures, layoffs and lost investment.

At the same time, Wisconsin farmers have adopted hemp as a “strong diversification option,” the letter notes. The state had 470 federally licensed hemp producers as of November 2025.

“Regulatory uncertainty surrounding the definition of hemp undermines their ability to plan responsibly and threatens to disrupt crop selection, with the potential to leave fields sitting idle for the 2026 season and beyond,” he wrote.

The guv is calling for federal legislative action to avoid these outcomes, noting the expected harms would fall largely on rural communities in Wisconsin. While he’s urging the state’s members of Congress to pursue a “workable, science-based hemp definition” that avoids economic harm, Evers also points to other temporary solutions.

“At the very least, I urge you to support federal legislation to delay the effective date of the new federal hemp definition by an additional two years, such as S. 3686, the Hemp Planting Predictability Act,” he wrote, noting this would give farmers and businesses more time to adjust their operations and avoid “abrupt” disruptions.

See the letter and release.

— The Wisconsin Association of Independent Colleges and Universities is backing two legislative proposals to create grant programs supporting its members and students.

One bill would establish an Innovation Grant Program administered by WEDC that would provide one-time, competitive grants to private, nonprofit colleges. The funding would be used to create new academic programs aimed at addressing workforce shortages, form partnerships with industry and others, and infrastructure projects.

The other bill would create an Undergraduate Assistance Grant Program for students at the state’s private, nonprofit colleges and universities, modeled after an existing program that supports students at Universities of Wisconsin campuses.

WAICU argues existing student aid programs for the lowest-income students leaves those in the middle-income range without needed financial support. The group says those in this range — above eligibility range for Pell Grant funding but below $60,000 in household income — face a “funding gap” that makes it difficult for them to afford tuition and living costs.

“Our students receive state financial aid, primarily in the form of Wisconsin Grants, which represents less than 2 percent of all higher education spending in Wisconsin,” WAICU President and CEO Eric Fulcomer said in a statement. “Yet for every $1 the state invests in our students, $161 is generated in Wisconsin’s economy.”

Leaders of WAICU members will provide testimony in support of both bills today at the state Capitol.

See more in the release.

— State-chartered credit unions in Wisconsin added $4.3 billion in assets over the course of 2025, according to newly released figures.

The Department of Financial Institutions yesterday announced total assets at these 98 credit unions grew to $70.3 billion at the end of 2025. At the same time, shares and deposits increased by $3.4 billion and outstanding loans rose by $2.9 billion.

DFI Office of Credit Unions Deputy Director Troy Kaja says credit unions showed “sound financial performance” last year, noting the ratio of delinquent loans to total loans declined while growth ratios remained positive.

“The return on average assets ratio increased significantly over the last year, which contributed to strong net worth levels,” Kaja said in a statement.

See the release.

— The Versiti Blood Research Institute is getting $11.5 million from the nonprofit MACC Fund, supporting efforts to address childhood cancers.

The Milwaukee-based blood health organization yesterday announced the financial committment from Midwest Athletes Against Childhood Cancer, Inc., saying it will “accelerate high-impact research already underway” in pediadric leukemia and other areas.

Funding will be used for recruiting and retaining scientists, expanding capacity for translational research, funding existing clinical and laboratory studies and more. Versiti currently has four faculty-level researchers leading projects on pediadric leukemia, and plans to add up to two more within the coming year.

Meanwhile, the institute says it’s conducting two active clinical and translational studies and six active scientific studies, which collectively include 20 research staff. Within the past two years, its researchers have published 54 peer-reviewed scientific articles.

Focus areas for Versiti researchers include precision cancer immunotherapies, efforts to “train” patients’ immune systems to fight off cancer, the clinical use of “natural killer cells” within the immune system, reducing toxicity for existing treatments, and using AI to improve therapies.

Becky Pinter, president and CEO of the MMAC Fund, says kids fighting cancer “deserve better” options for treatment.

“By expanding our support, we’re empowering researchers to move discoveries from the lab to life-changing treatments, faster, smarter, and with renewed hope for every child to thrive,” she said in a statement on the funding.

See the release.

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