Missouri news

Missouri governor and Google announce $15 billion data center in Montgomery County

KBIA | By KOMU 8

Published May 21, 2026 at 7:26 AM CDT

Billy Dobbs, left, and Dillon Dobbs hold a "No Data Center" sign during a town hall meeting on Jan. 30 at the Montgomery County High School gymnasium in Montgomery County. "The sign is my father's idea," Dobbs said. "I am here to stand up for what's right and stand up for this community."

Google will operate the second data center in the New Florence area, which already has an Amazon Web Services data center in the works.

NEW FLORENCE — Missouri Gov. Mike Kehoe on Wednesday afternoon announced Google will invest $15 billion into a data center in Montgomery County.

This is the second data center under construction in the county, the other operated by Amazon. Kehoe championed the investment in a news release, but these developments have received mixed feedback from Montgomery County residents.

"Google's historic investment in Montgomery County is a testament to Missouri's growing reputation as a premier destination for innovation and next-generation technology," Kehoe said in a news release.

The news release said Google will pay for all the power the data center uses and new infrastructure costs.

The release said the data center will utilize advanced air cooling technology, which it said will limit water consumption "to uses like kitchens."

This comes amid intense concerns from community members over an additional Amazon Web Services data center in the county.

Montgomery County commissioners approved tax abatements for that project in December 2025. Town halls that same month drew large crowds of residents opposed to the project.

In February, a community group filed a lawsuit accusing commissioners of violating the Missouri Sunshine Law by not providing enough advanced notice of meetings regarding the data center projects, not giving specifics of how much water the Amazon data center would use and not disclosing what happened in multiple closed-door meetings. The lawsuit seeks to halt the project until this information is made available. The next scheduled action in the lawsuit is a hearing on June 1.

For the Google data center announced Wednesday, Kehoe's release said every direct job at the center will create nine more jobs in the community. It also said Google will collaborate with the Construction Laborers and Contractors Joint Training Fund of Eastern Missouri to "support training for more than 2,300 construction workers over the next two years."

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