By Colin Street
“They wanted to make this whole place a coal mine, and now that we’re realizing that won’t work, we don’t know what to do.” This quote from Mark,1 a farmer I interviewed in McDowell County, West Virginia, perfectly describes the broken promises of extractive industries in the state. Industries such as timber, coal, and natural gas have dominated West Virginia’s economy for generations with guarantees of economic prosperity; however, those guarantees have not been realized (Stump 2021). Instead, those same extractive industries have left West Virginia as the fourth poorest state in the nation, with a poverty rate of 16.7 percent (WVCBP 2025) and a median annual income just over $33,000 (US Census Bureau n.d.).These same industries have poisoned West Virginia’s landscape, ranking 47th worst in the nation (EPA n.d.), about 250,000 West Virginians lack access to quality drinking water (Hanson 2025).
Today, a new wave of extraction sits on the horizon of West Virginia’s hills. This time, it takes the form of data centers, evident with the passage of West Virginia House Bill 2014 in the 2025 Legislative Session (HB 2014 2025). HB 2014 strips local governments of their ability to dictate data center developments and allows said developments to conceal their projected pollution outputs and water usage as “trade secrets,” all while setting no requirements for in-state job creation or investment (Coyne 2025). HB 2014 also directs 50 percent of the tax revenue generated from data centers to the personal income tax reduction fund. Beyond being the largest revenue-generating mechanism for the state of West Virginia (WVTD n.d.), the personal income tax is progressive, which means that its phase-out disproportionately benefits West Virginia’s wealthiest individuals (TPC 2024). Further, HB 2014 diverts 10 percent of data center tax revenue to all West Virginia counties on a per capita basis (HB 2014 2025). By providing funding to already cash-strapped counties, the data center industry is employing a former coal-industry tactic by building support among county commissions and leveraging their existing relationships with state representatives to prevent further industry reform (Stump 2021). This is the standard extraction playbook: The industry promises jobs and economic prosperity, state politicians establish legal structures that prioritize industry over people, and that industry fails to deliver on its promises, instead overusing already scarce natural resources, polluting what remains, and transporting its profits across state lines.
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