New filings put numbers behind the proposed Salem campus’s water demand while the project waits to advance into formal city review.
Salem’s proposed Oakline at Mill Creek data center has reached a procedural pause just as new filings answer one of the biggest questions surrounding the project: how much city water it could actually use.
The City of Salem notified Verrus subsidiary Alderstone LLC on Aug. 28 that its July 31 land-use application is incomplete. That does not amount to a denial, but it means the application has not yet moved into substantive review and the public-comment period has not opened.
Alderstone has until Jan. 27, 2027, 180 days from its original filing, to respond with additional information or tell the city it will proceed without some or all of the requested material. The city could conduct more than one round of completeness review before the application advances.
While that process continues, a separate Aug. 11 filing from Verrus provides the clearest picture yet of Oakline’s expected municipal water demand.
The application currently before Salem covers Phase 1: two roughly 300,000-square-foot data center buildings and a new electrical substation. Verrus estimates those facilities would use about 13 million gallons of municipal water in an average year, rising to as much as 23 million gallons in a maximum-use year. The city’s land-use portal confirms the current application covers two buildings totaling 600,000 square feet.
For scale, 13 million gallons is roughly equivalent to the amount of water about 120 average American families use at home over a year, based on the EPA’s estimate that the average family uses more than 300 gallons per day. It is also roughly equivalent to the annual water use of 12 100,000-square-foot K-12 schools, using the EPA’s median school benchmark, or about the annual use associated with a 120-bed general hospital using the EPA’s median per-bed benchmark.
An Oregon golf facility, by comparison, used an average of 43.7 million gallons annually in a statewide study cited by the Oregon Water Resources Department. That is more than three times Phase 1’s projected average annual consumption.
Those comparisons illustrate scale rather than identical patterns of use. Homes, schools, hospitals, golf courses and data centers can consume water at very different times and for very different purposes. EPA guidance also cautions that climate, equipment and operating characteristics can significantly affect comparisons between facilities.
Most days would look much different. Verrus estimates typical off-peak consumption at about 50,000 gallons per day, primarily for landscaping and normal building needs. The company says its main cooling system recirculates water through a closed loop without continuously consuming it.
The larger draw would come during Salem’s hottest weather.
Verrus expects an adiabatic cooling system to operate roughly 20 to 25 days per year. Under an extreme-heat scenario approaching Salem’s record temperatures, Phase 1 could draw about 2.1 million gallons in a single day, with roughly 2 million gallons attributed to cooling.
That peak can also be measured against Salem’s broader water system. City Public Works data lists Salem’s existing peak-day water demand at approximately 49 million gallons, compared with average demand of 36 million gallons per day. The city’s Public Works strategic plan says recent investments have expanded treatment capacity at the Geren Island Water Treatment Facility to 67 million gallons per day.
If Salem were using 49 million gallons on a peak day while Phase 1 simultaneously reached its projected 2.1-million-gallon maximum, total demand would be approximately 51.1 million gallons that day. That would remain about 15.9 million gallons below the 67-million-gallon treatment-capacity figure.
The comparison suggests the project’s estimated Phase 1 peak demand would fit within the city’s reported treatment capacity when measured against Salem’s currently reported peak-day use. It does not, however, guarantee that capacity will be available under every future condition. Salem is updating its Water System Master Plan, and an earlier city conservation plan projected maximum-day demand could rise as the community grows. The project itself also remains subject to the city’s utility and development review.
Those figures also clarify the size of what Salem is considering now. A previously discussed third building is not included in the current application. Verrus identifies it as a future Phase 2 that would require its own site-plan review and permits.
If all three buildings were eventually constructed, Verrus currently estimates about 19.4 million gallons of water in an average year, up to 34.4 million gallons in a maximum year, and a possible maximum-day demand of approximately 3.1 million gallons.
At the projected 19.4-million-gallon annual average, the completed campus would use roughly as much water as about 177 American families use at home in a year and about 44% of the annual water use of the average Oregon golf facility in the statewide study.
Even the three-building maximum-day estimate provides additional context. Adding 3.1 million gallons to Salem’s reported 49-million-gallon peak day would produce approximately 52.1 million gallons of combined demand, still about 14.9 million gallons below Geren Island’s reported 67-million-gallon treatment capacity. Because the third building is not part of the application now before Salem, however, that comparison describes a potential future buildout rather than the project currently under review.
The company has also told Salem it is willing to establish maximum daily and annual water-use limits and use on-site storage to reduce peak demand on the municipal system. The city has not yet approved those figures or the project.
Oakline’s permitting process is moving alongside a broader debate over data centers in Salem. The city’s new nine-member Data Center Task Force meets Wednesday from 4 to 6 p.m. at Salem Public Library, beginning work on a policy framework for future data-center development.
The task force is expected to hold at least three public town halls and bring proposed recommendations to the City Council by Dec. 31.
For Oakline itself, however, the next move belongs to Alderstone. Until the company responds to Salem’s incomplete-application notice and the city determines the filing is complete, the project remains short of the stage where formal public review begins.