CoreSite CEO Defends Data Centers Against Community Opposition
CoreSite CEO Juan Font argues that data centers are essential digital infrastructure and disputes claims that they are primary environmental pollutants.
Juan Font, President and CEO of CoreSite, describes data centers as the essential backbone of the modern digital economy, supporting critical services ranging from healthcare and emergency response to banking and smartphone applications. Addressing the not-in-my-backyard movement, Font disputes claims that these facilities are primary pollutants, noting that they are often cleaner than previous land uses.
Font points to aggressive carbon reduction goals from major cloud providers such as Google, Amazon, and Microsoft as evidence of industry sustainability. He distinguishes between AI training facilities, which can be located anywhere with cheap power, and inference and media services, which must remain near population centers to reduce latency.
While highlighting economic benefits—such as high-paying jobs and property tax contributions—Font identifies power availability as the industry's primary bottleneck. He attributes this to the energy-intensive nature of GPU-based AI architectures and a general underinvestment in the electrical grid. In Fairfax County, CoreSite created 50 new jobs paying 50% above the median salary to qualify for tax incentives.
