SKAGIT COUNTY, WA (MyBellinghamNow.com) – The nationwide debate around large-scale tech facilities is making its way to northwest Washington.

The Skagit County Board of Commissioners voted unanimously on Monday, June 1, to adopt a moratorium on new data centers in rural parts of the county. The interim ordinance will prevent any permits applications from being accepted for six months while the county crafts regulations.

The county is defining data centers as “facilities meant to house computers and related equipment that are larger than 2,000 square feet or have a total anticipated load of two megawatts or greater.”

Skagit County’s Senior Deputy of Natural Resources Will Honea told the board that the county can be seen as an attractive location for data centers.

“Data centers need a couple of things that we have in Skagit County. They can have relatively large footprints, meaning they require a considerable amount of acreage,” Honea said at the meeting. “We have a lot of open space here, a lot of land that hasn’t been intensively developed, because of our restrictive zoning. That means land here in Skagit County, particularly natural resource land, is actually quite cheap compared to other places.”

The county hasn’t received any applications for data centers yet but is aiming to get ahead of what it sees as an inevitable debate since there’s currently nothing in the county code that defines or regulates them.

“The Skagit Valley is subject to large floods, volcanic lahar, and other major natural risk, and summertime water limitations mean that Skagit farmers already have a hard time getting the water they need,” said Skagit County Commissioner Peter Browning. “As we contemplate the possibility of data centers in our community, we have a duty to recognize and respond to the limitations that nature imposes.”

The board will hold a required public hearing on the moratorium at 10:30 a.m. on July 14.

It comes as a bill that aimed to place guardrails on data centers in the state died on the House floor earlier this year.