Amazon Data Services is the buyer of a Becker site slated for a major data center development, according to an electronic certificate of real estate value filed last week.
Amazon paid $73.56 million for the 348-acre parcel, according to the CRV. The transaction closed Oct. 30.
The seller was Elk River Technologies, a Minnesota LLC associated with Diode Ventures, a Kansas-based “global infrastructure solutions” company that serves clients in the data center, telecommunications and renewable energy sectors. Elk River Technologies purchased the site from Xcel Energy in April for $7.97 million, according to a certificate of real estate value.
“Working with businesses looking to expand into these communities brings about economic growth and job creation,” said Xcel spokesperson Kevin Cross. “As the electric provider for the area, we will be engaged in the site development process and providing the electricity needed to reliably power the site once operational.”
Xcel Energy said at the time that Elk River Technologies was looking to develop a “turnkey data center development” on the site with an estimated $1 billion in investment to the city of Becker. The project is expected to see 1,200 construction jobs created, followed by 100 permanent roles upon completion.
Large-scale data centers require hundreds of megawatts of electric power, equivalent to tens or even hundreds of thousands of homes, and utilities often take years to evaluate their requests to connect to the grid. That means data center developers typically approach electric utilities before seeking land use permits from local governments
Xcel and Elk River had been discussing the potential development since as early as 2022, though no end-user was named. Becker Community Development Director Jacob Sanders told the city planning commission in May that his office had not received any permit applications or timing updates from Elk River Technologies. Sanders told Finance & Commerce in September that neither the Elk River Technologies site nor a nearby site controlled by Microsoft had seen construction activity.
“We are constantly evaluating new locations based on customer demand. We recently purchased land in Becker and are performing due diligence in exploring possible data center locations,” and Amazon spokesperson said in a statement.
The energy company was previously in talks with Google to develop a data center in Becker, but those plans fell through in 2022.
In February of this year, Microsoft bought close to 300 acres of land from Xcel in Becker.
The Minneapolis-based utility plans to close three big coal-fired generators at Sherco by 2030. First built in 1976, the coal-powered plant has a capacity of up to 2,238MW and is the largest power plant in the state. The site was initially constructed by Northern States Power Company (NSP), now a subsidiary of Xcel Energy.
Xcel is building a 710-megawatt solar farm nearby that it says will be fully operational by 2026 and has been closely involved in other efforts to redevelop the area.
