Data centers and water
Data Center Water Use in Fairfax County, VA
Fairfax County, Virginia has 50 mapped data center facilities, including AWS, carrying about 414 MW of estimated power load.
Water pressure for new demandHow hard a large new water user, like a data center, would press on this county's water. It blends recent drinking-water compliance, drought, and existing industrial demand. Higher pressure means new demand competes harder with current uses. It is not a judgment about whether one should be built.
Low water pressure
Fairfax County has no health violations in the last 5 years, moderate drought, low existing industrial water demand.
- Mapped facilities
- 50
- EPA + OpenStreetMap layers
- Estimated power load
- 414 MW
- IM3 Atlas capacity estimate
- Permitted discharge
- Not reported
- Clean Water Act permit fields
- DCWSI national rank
- #1
- of 318 scored counties
The operators
How many data centers are in Fairfax County?
50 facilities are mapped to Fairfax County, Virginia across the EPA and OpenStreetMap layers, run by operators including AWS. Counts reflect mapped footprint, not an operator's total fleet.
- OpenStreetMap
8100 Boone Boulevard
Digital Realty · 51
- EPA ECHO
AMAZON DATA SERVICES INC - DCA-64
AWS · SPRINGFIELD, VA
- EPA ECHO
AMAZON DATA SERVICES INC - IAD-134/135/136
AWS · CHANTILLY, VA
- EPA ECHO
AMAZON DATA SERVICES INC - IAD-165/166/167/168/613
AWS · HERNDON, VA
- EPA ECHO
AMAZON DATA SERVICES INC - IAD-500/501
AWS · HERNDON, VA
- EPA ECHO
AMAZON DATA SERVICES, INC. IAD-1 IAD-9
AWS · CHANTILLY, VA
- EPA ECHO
AMAZON DCA-54
AWS · FORT BELVOIR, VA
- OpenStreetMap
Amazon IAD-1
AWS · Chantilly, VA
- OpenStreetMap
Amazon IAD-165
AWS · Herndon, VA
- OpenStreetMap
Amazon IAD-166
AWS · Herndon, VA
- OpenStreetMap
Amazon IAD-167
AWS · Herndon, VA
- OpenStreetMap
Amazon IAD-168
AWS · Herndon, VA
- OpenStreetMap
Amazon IAD-500
AWS · Herndon, VA
- OpenStreetMap
Amazon IAD-9
AWS · Chantilly, VA
- OpenStreetMap
Amazon IAD22
AWS · 51
- OpenStreetMap
Amazon Web Services
AWS · 51
- OpenStreetMap
Amazon Web Services
AWS · 51
- EPA ECHO
CARLYLE REALTY PARTNERS V, L.P.
RESTON, VA
32 more mapped facilities counted in this county's score.
Supply versus demand
How much water do Fairfax County data centers use?
Exact facility water draw is rarely public. As a screening proxy we compare the Clean Water Act permitted discharge mapped to these facilities against the county's entire industrial water baseline from the USGS 2020 series.
No Clean Water Act permitted discharge is reported for the mapped facilities in Fairfax County. The figures below show the county's industrial water baseline for context.
- Mapped facility discharge
- Not reported
- County industrial baseline
- 0.33 Mgal/day
Model a build
Can Fairfax County support more data centers?
On the water-pressure scale, Fairfax County sits at 19, below the national median, so new large-load demand has more slack here than in most counties. Size a hypothetical build to see the daily draw against the county industrial baseline.
Data Center Water Budget Calculator
Estimate daily water use for a hypothetical facility in Fairfax County.
Your facility would use 241.0% of this county's industrial water baseline. Verify water rights and long-term drought projections before committing.
Based on USGS 2020 water-use data and EPA-standard cooling intensity constants. Not a substitute for site-specific water rights analysis.
In context
How does Fairfax County compare nationally?
- DCWSI build-out rank
- #1
- of 318 counties with a stress score
- Water pressure vs median
- 0
- national median is 19 of 100
- Share of mapped load
- 0.2%
- of 166.02 GW mapped nationally
Fairfax County is one of 330 US counties with mapped data centers. See the full ranking and the interactive map in the national atlas.
Facility data combines EPA ECHO, EPA Clean Water Act permits, OpenStreetMap, and the IM3 Open Source Data Center Atlas (DOE/PNNL), geocoded to county FIPS. Capacity and water baselines come from IM3 and USGS 2020 water-use data. These are county-level screening figures, not a facility-level water-use audit. Read the full methodology.