In surprise to NSA, Utah Data Center may pay tax on electricity (uses $40M/year in electric)
Under a bill the 2013 Utah Legislature passed, the National Security Agency’s new Bluffdale data center might be taxed on the millions of dollars of energy it is expected to consume, providing a potential windfall for an obscure state authority.
The NSA is protesting the possible tax, even though a Utah attorney said he informed the agency about HB325, and the top U.S. electronic spy agency voiced no opposition until an official emailed Gov. Gary Herbert’s staff weeks after Herbert signed the measure.
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HB325, which Herbert signed into law April 1, benefits the Utah Military Installation Development Authority (MIDA). It allows the entity, which was set up to put select military properties on the public tax rolls, to collect a tax of up to 6 percent on Rocky Mountain Power electricity used by the Utah Data Center.
While the NSA has offered no specifics about the Utah Data Center’s operations, a 2012 Wired magazine article, citing former intelligence and NSA officials, said computers at the data center will collect electronic information — from emails to cellphone records to purchasing receipts — from all over the world, store it and look for threatening patterns. The article estimated the Utah Data Center would consume $40 million of electricity a year — a level of consumption at which the NSA would have to pay up to another $2.4 million annually to satisfy the tax HB325 could impose.
http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/politics/56304956-90/utah-data-nsa-mida.html.csp
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