Kentucky Industrial Alliance is challenging both a new data center moratorium and the city's 2024 annexation of the 600-acre site near Mammoth Cave National Park.
Kentucky Industrial Alliance has sued Cave City, Kentucky, after officials approved a one-year moratorium on new data centers days after the developer proposed a $4.8 billion, 600-acre, 1.2-gigawatt AI and cloud computing campus near Mammoth Cave National Park. The company filed two lawsuits, including a challenge to the city's 2024 annexation of the property, arguing the land should remain outside city limits and beyond the reach of the moratorium. The dispute highlights a broader national clash over how much authority local governments have to slow or block AI infrastructure projects as concerns rise over power use, water, land impacts, and proximity to protected areas. Cave City officials say they need time to assess developments of that scale, while the developer says the project would bring billions of dollars in investment, about 360 direct and indirect jobs, and millions of dollars in annual tax revenue. Opposition has focused on potential groundwater, sinkhole, electricity demand, and other environmental risks tied to the region's karst landscape (terrain formed by soluble rock).