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The DEP will hold a virtual public meeting Monday on two permit applications from New York City-based TransGas Development Systems LLC to build neighboring gas-powered facilities for data center campus operations in Mingo County. The proposed facilities are the Adams Fork Harless Data Center Energy Campus to be located off of 22 Mine Road near Holden and Adams Fork Data Energy Center to be located at 2002 Twisted Gun Road in Wharncliffe.

The proposed TransGas facilities would have the potential to emit hundreds of air pollutants, and the applications indicate there would be onsite haul road activities and equipment leaks.

The DEP has received roughly 50 comments on the TransGas applications, DEP spokesperson Terry Fletcher said last week.

The West Virginia Citizen Action Group, a progressive advocacy organization, had called for the DEP to hold public hearings covering both planned facilities.

“The public will bear the cost of living with air emissions, without any benefit to the public grid, and may face increased electric bills,� West Virginia Climate Alliance coordinator Tyler Cannon wrote in a recent published by West Virginia Citizen Action Group.

DEP consideration of the TransGas applications comes amid a push by state leaders to draw data center development to West Virginia.

, which Gov. Patrick Morrisey hailed as the economic development centerpiece of the Legislature’s 2025 regular legislative session, is designed to ease in-state data center development in part by prohibiting counties and municipalities from enforcing or adopting regulations that limit creation, development or operation of any certified microgrid district or high-impact data center project.

Facility startups slated for beginning of 2027  

The planned TransGas facilities are off-grid power-generating facilities that Fletcher said would be more than 14 miles apart.

The construction permits would be for data center energy campus operations in Mingo County on 22 Mine Road near Holden, and on Twisted Gun Road near Wharncliffe, respectively, according to the applications. Construction is planned to begin after receipt of the Division of Air Quality permit and other regulatory approvals around Jan. 1, 2026, with operations to start roughly 12 months after construction begins, per the permit applications.

The applications list Jan. 1, 2027, as the date of anticipated startups for the proposed facilities.

Potential to emit hundreds of tons of air pollutants 

Ultra-low-sulfur diesel would be stored in 40 tanks on the property near the facilities, per the applications. Powerhouses would have one set of emission control fluid tanks for hydrous ammonia, caustic soda, sulfuric acid, sodium chlorite and sodium hydrosulfide. A natural gas pipeline would feed facility engines.

Those substances carry significant safety and health risks, according to data sheets included in the applications. Sodium hydrosulfide contains hydrogen sulfide, a highly toxic gas with a rotten egg odor. Sodium chlorite is very toxic to aquatic life with long-lasting effects. Sulfuric acid is carcinogenic to humans.

The facilities would have haul road activities and equipment leaks, according to the applications.

Each facility would have the potential to emit:

• 206 tons per year of carbon monoxide
• 194 tons per year of nitrogen oxides
• 118 tons per year of volatile organic compounds

The facilities would have the potential to emit 187 and 188 tons per year, respectively, of fine particulate matter, or soot, which can pierce the lungs and lead to asthma attacks, heart attacks and premature death.

TransGas’ applications follow the DEP’s March 2024 approval of an air quality permit for an ammonia production site near Wharncliffe planned by the company, which applied for approval to build up to six 6,000-metric ton-per day ammonia plants on reclaimed surface mine land.

The process, according to DEP records, would be to “crack� natural gas into hydrogen and carbon components using proprietary autothermal reforming technology and to chill ammonia vapor to make liquid ammonia for storage and transport.

TransGas has announced plans to capture and store carbon dioxide underground as part of the production process in what it has called its “Adams Fork� project — a label also used for its proposed data center operations.