Nearby counties will benefit from Madison County luring Amazon
When industries plan huge financial investments in Southern states, there is always the hope of improved lives in the affected locales.
In Mississippi that means part-suburb and part-rural as Amazon AWS plans to spend at least $10 billion to build two data centers in Madison County.
That big project involving more than 1,000 new jobs (at perhaps $60,000-plus each) dwarfs one in the South’s major economic powerhouse state, Georgia, where electric automaker Rivian will invest $5 billion in a rural area east of Atlanta.
Madison County already is doing better economically than most Mississippi counties due to top public schools and strong leadership. According to statista.com, the county’s median household income is $75,000, far above the state average of $48,000.
You could say with some justification that it’s a matter of the rich getting richer, but no state rejects these projects. Residents of nearby rural counties will benefit from Madison County’s luring of Amazon to its fold.
Barring some unforeseen generation slowdown or problem involving the vast amount of electric power that will be required by Amazon, the Mississippi deal represents more of an environmentally clean project than the EV plant in Georgia, which has attracted many “green” dissentients at the mere sight of red clay being moved around the plant’s site.
Concerns about environmental problems at the Georgia vehicle factory — announced in 2021, but far from “up and running” — may actually be secondary to the monetary incentives package offered Rivian, partially owned by Ford, to locate there in the first place.
Residents of the rural area 50 miles from Atlanta, just off Interstate 20, where it would be constructed, raised unshirted heck when Rivian announced intentions to build the facility — and when Georgia offered to give away the bank and the store to attract its largest economic development partner in state history.
Citizens of those rural localities don’t cater to their rural way of life potentially being trampled by industrial smokestacks, water resource contamination, destruction of habitat for wildlife and noise pollution.
Rivian’s problems are beyond environmental roadblocks. The company recently announced it would delay construction of the Georgia plant to concentrate on producing electric vehicles elsewhere, making them available sooner to customers willing to pay an average of $55,000 to drive away from a dealer.
The company has been losing money for several years and believes the quicker production of models will put it in better financial stead. Rivian has fallen behind product leader Tesla in the EV race.
Away from the fledgling electric vehicle industry, several states have been engaged in the economic development race toward landing softer industrial clients like the Amazon data facilities bound for the area north of Jackson.
Entergy-Mississippi will spend upwards of $3 billion to add natural gas-generating assets and scattered solar power fields to its present capacities for producing electric power for the future. Georgia Power Co. has intentions to increase generation, as well.
Power company leaders have said none of those plans will increase power rates for its residential or routine business customers. They say rates could drop.
As with Rivian in Georgia, Mississippi is providing Amazon Web Services some of the usual sweeteners to come here, including myriad tax breaks, juicy construction costs rebates and workforce training programs. The $259 million package would increase as employment rises.
Data centers are among the world’s fastest-growing enterprises. In that realm, we’ll be hearing more about artificial intelligence, digital transformation, cloud collocation, hyperscale functionality, pattern recognition, sentiment analysis — and two industry words of true bafflement to us digital simpletons, “mantrap” and “sally port.” The digerati must be pleased.
— Mac Gordon, a native of McComb, is a retired newspaperman. He can be reached at macmarygordon@gmail.com.