Wake County, North Carolina Zoning: The Data Center Rezoning Wave

A statewide data-center rezoning surge has reached Wake County

Driven largely by AI-industry demand, North Carolina has seen more than 20 new data-center projects announced since the start of 2025, and local governments across the state have responded with a wave of moratoriums -- temporary pauses on accepting or approving new rezoning requests, special-use permits, or site plans for hyperscale data-center development while a jurisdiction studies the issue and drafts standards. Coverage tracking this trend (a dedicated NC data-center newsletter, Carolina Public Press, and the Carolina Journal) reports that the number of North Carolina data-center moratoriums adopted in 2026 is roughly four times the total adopted in all of 2025 -- this is a genuinely fast-moving, current regulatory phenomenon, not a settled or slow-moving zoning category.

Wake County itself is part of that wave: the Town of Apex, an incorporated municipality inside Wake County, has adopted its own data-center moratorium, joining neighboring Orange County, the City of Durham, and Chatham County. A moratorium of this kind typically lasts several months to a year and gives the town time to draft location and operational standards for hyperscale data centers -- noise, buffer distances from residential areas, water use for cooling, and electrical-substation proximity are common issues these ordinances end up addressing -- before any new project can move forward.

The specific project driving Apex's response: a 190-acre "New Hill Digital Campus"

The concrete project behind this moratorium is a proposed roughly 190-acre hyperscale data-center development in the New Hill area, filed by developer Natelli Investments LLC, which requires both annexation into the Town of Apex and rezoning to move forward -- since the land in question sits in unincorporated Wake County today and would need to become part of Apex's jurisdiction to be developed as proposed. Reported construction timing, if approved, targets late 2026 to early 2027. A local community group, the Protect Wake County Coalition, has organized specifically in opposition to this project, publishing materials opposing the New Hill Digital Campus and related large-scale data-center development in the area -- a sign this is a genuinely contested, actively litigated-in-the-public-square zoning question rather than a routine administrative rezoning.

For a buyer evaluating land in or near the New Hill area, or any other large, currently-unincorporated parcel near a Wake County municipality's edge, the practical lesson is the same one the county hub already flags for other reasons: annexation and municipal rezoning can change what a parcel can become, sometimes quickly and sometimes over sustained public opposition. A parcel's current unincorporated, agricultural, or rural-residential zoning designation is not a reliable predictor of what surrounds it in five years if it sits inside or adjacent to a mapped growth or utility corridor that a data-center developer has identified as attractive -- proximity to high-capacity electrical transmission infrastructure is typically the single biggest siting factor for this kind of project.

What to check before buying near a potential data-center site

• Ask the relevant municipality (Apex, or whichever town has jurisdiction or ETJ reach over the parcel) directly whether a data-center moratorium is currently in effect, when it expires, and whether new siting/operational standards have been drafted or adopted -- moratoriums by design are temporary, and the underlying rules that eventually replace them will determine what's actually allowed long-term.
• Check whether a specific annexation or rezoning petition (like the New Hill Digital Campus filing) is pending for land near your target parcel -- Wake County and municipal planning department websites publish active rezoning-case lists, and community opposition groups like the Protect Wake County Coalition often track filings in more real-time detail than official channels.
• If you're buying specifically because a data-center project nearby might affect land value (either up, from proximity to new infrastructure investment, or down, from noise/traffic/water-use concerns), get current, project-specific information rather than relying on general "data centers are booming" narratives -- the regulatory outcome for any specific parcel is still being actively decided in 2026, not settled.
• For land intended for a data-center use itself, confirm current electrical transmission/substation capacity and water availability directly with Wake County or Duke Energy/the relevant utility, since these two factors -- not zoning designation alone -- typically determine whether a parcel is genuinely viable for this use even where zoning would otherwise allow it.