As a lifelong Montanan, raised with genuine respect for the land and our role as its stewards, I find the proposed AI data center at the Bonner Mill site by Krambu Inc. deeply unsettling. This project threatens to disrupt the delicate ecological balance of our beloved Blackfoot River, a cherished natural resource that plays a vital role in our community's environmental and cultural identity. The thought of an AI data center, with its massive infrastructure and potential for pollution, overshadowing one of Montana's iconic landscapes is disheartening.

I own Big Sky Flies, a local Missoula-based metal art studio, and the potential negative impact of Krambu Inc.'s facility on small businesses is alarming. The data center's enormous power demands are likely to strain the NorthWestern Energy grid, which is likely to result in increased electricity rates that would present a significant burden to small business owners like myself. Such hikes have already been demonstrated in data center-heavy regions, and in Missoula this would burden welding operations and our community’s economy without delivering meaningful local jobs (just ~10 promised). Price hikes without boosted economy not only threaten our day-to-day operations in the short term but also challenge the very sustainability of small business communities that form the backbone of Montana’s economy and community.

Additionally, the data center's operation could set a precedent for further industrial developments in an area that residents have long fought to preserve for its historical and natural significance. Allowing this project to go forward may open the floodgates for additional developments that undervalue and exploit our local resources for corporate interests, denying the interests of the collective residents and taxpayers who actually live here.

I urge Missoula County to reject all permits associated with this data center proposal, thereby protecting our environment, our economy, and our community integrity. We need to stand united in preserving our local treasures, bolstering our economy in ways that favor Montanans over corporations, and ensuring consistent energy costs that allow small businesses to thrive without fear of overwhelming financial strain from external developments.

Please join me in opposing this project to safeguard our region against unsustainable industrial growth that benefits a wealthy few at the expense of the common many. I implore Missoula County officials to prioritize our community and environment by refusing Krambu Inc.'s application and take a stand for the future of Montana's rich landscapes and vibrant local businesses. Sign this petition and be a voice for responsible stewardship and community-centric progress.

 

 

Update 5/18/26

The “Special Exception” permit will be approved or denied on July 1st at 6p.m. 

In person location: 200 W. Broadway, Missoula County Courthouse, Sophie Moise Room

Virtual option via Microsoft Teams. Links can be found on the Consolidated Land Use Board page.

We call on everyone locally available to attend this meeting and show the decision makers of this issue (MCCLUB) how united we are in rejecting this permit.

 

Who Decides This?

Although this petition lists the Missoula County Commissioners as the decision makers, the “Special Exception” that will permit Krambu to set up shop in the Bonner Mill Industrial Park will be reviewed and either declined or accepted by the Missoula County Consolidated Land Use Board. 

 

Missoula County Consolidated Land Use Board (MCCLUB)

 

Andy Mefford

Richard (Rick) Hall

Danny Oberweiser, Jr.

Jennifer Schultz

Barbara H Raible

Josh Schroeder

James "Bing" Matt

Michael Settevendemie

Chris Saale

 

These people hold the power to reject the “Special Exception” permit that Krambu needs to go forward. I hold this group and each individual fully accountable for the decision made in the next step of this process. The 5000+ people who have signed this petition should not be disregarded by this board of 9 people, especially in the absence of any show of support for the project beyond Krambu themselves. We are here to observe this process and access the system in place. Will this board deny the tech corporation Krambu, or will they deny the 5000+ undersigned who absolutely reject the idea of permitting any data center to set up shop to experiment, expand, and exploit the Bonner Milltown Historic district?

 

Lets Talk TIF

“The Montana project reflects KRAMBU’s mission to transform stranded or underutilized industrial sites into regenerative digital infrastructure—turning brownfields into AI powerhouses that serve local communities and global innovation at once.” -Krambu.com

Behind this polished promise is a very different reality. “Turning brownfields into AI powerhouses” isn’t just a vision—it’s a playbook for using Tax Increment Financing (TIF) to shift the cost of private infrastructure onto the public.

Currently, Krambu is proposing a modest 3 MW operation. But, under Montana’s TIF laws, Krambu could (and openly plans to) build the massive infrastructure required for a 100MW data center—power systems, grid upgrades, roads, and utilities—then pay themselves back using future property tax revenue generated within the district.

That revenue would normally go to schools, emergency services, and the community. But with this TIF funding it can be diverted for years—potentially decades—to reimburse a private company for infrastructure built specifically for its own high-energy, low-employment operation. This isn’t “regenerative development.” It’s a shady backdoor mechanism that allows a corporation to front the cost, then use public tax dollars to make itself whole—while local residents absorb the long-term negative tradeoffs.

 

US vs CHINA?

Krambu asks the people of Bonner to ignore the effects this data center will have on the community in order to beat China in the race for AI dominance. I find that argument repulsively deceptive, since it is American tech companies like Microsoft, Google, Nvidia, and Meta that spent years training Chinese scientists and engineers, coauthoring their research, and directly selling them the tools they need to build China’s AI power. Microsoft has been the most significant contributor through Microsoft Research Asia in Beijing, which opened in 1998. This research alone trained thousands of Chinese scientists and engineers, becoming something of a finishing school for China’s tech elite. The founders and top executives of major Chinese tech firms passed through Microsoft’s labs, including Zhang Yiming of ByteDance, TikTok’s parent company. Google opened an AI China Center in Beijing in December 2017, establishing a team of AI researchers supported by Google China’s engineering teams.

The real war isn’t US vs China. It’s our community vs. tech corporations loyal to no country.

 

Closed-loop system Blowdown

Closed-loop systems in data centers recirculate coolant internally but aren’t truly closed to the outer environment because mineral buildup from heat cycles requires periodic “blowdown:” draining contaminated water to prevent scaling or corrosion. This process expels waste externally in order to bring in fresh water, creating ongoing inputs/outputs that break the sealed cycle. If that blowdown is sent into onsite drains, septic infrastructure, a sewer connection, or subsurface disposal, it joins the same groundwater-driven pathway as local wastewater: into the porous river-bottom aquifer, then toward the Blackfoot-Clark Fork drainage downstream of the data center. 

The question for regulators is simple: what is in the blowdown, how often is it flushed, where exactly does it go, and how will it be kept out of the river system?

If that water is dumped into the ground, a drain, or the sewer system, it could travel underground the same way other wastewater does. Would a company driven by profit, not environmental conservation, really spend the money to cart the wastewater away for proper disposal, or would they dump it in the river located conveniently 238 yards away? Even if they say they will properly dispose of the water, how often is there oversight ensuring their compliance, versus opportunity to dump in the river when no one is watching? This precedent has already been set by other profit-hungry corporations like the Yellowstone Club in Big Sky, Montana, who have been contaminating the Gallatin River for years and unabashedly paying fines when caught instead of doing the right thing to protect our beloved state’s environment.

So the big environmental question is:

Where does the dirty cooling water go?

If it goes into the ground near the river, it could slowly end up downstream in the Blackfoot or Clark Fork River.

 

Clustering Strategy 

 

Krambu set its sights on Bonner because the Bonner Mill Industrial Park gives them a fast-start industrial shell, permissive zoning, room to scale, a story about brownfield reuse, and a potential path to turn one data center into a regional AI compute campus. The cluster model makes the site more valuable to Krambu than a standalone installation, though it also raises significant community concerns now being debated around power, water, noise, long-term expansion, and who the eventual tenants will be.

Neighbors of Bonner should understand that Krambu’s proposal is not just about one data center inside one old mill building; it is the first step toward something much larger.

If this first data center is approved, Krambu gains an irreversible foothold inside the Bonner Mill Industrial Park. From there, the company can begin building the infrastructure for future expansion: enhanced power access, cooling systems, fiber connections, server rooms, permits, tenants, and relationships with utilities and regulators. Krambu has already described its vision for Montana as an “AI factory” with room for future compute halls and co-located industries. They are already telling us their first facility will open the door to a much larger data center cluster at the mill site.

Once the first phase is operating, every future phase becomes easier to accomplish. The company can say the site is already industrial, already approved for data center use, already connected to power, and already equipped for cooling. What begins as one project becomes the foundation for turning the Bonner mill into a permanent high-density computing campus. This is why Bonner residents should not view this as a small, isolated proposal; alarm bells should be ringing loud and clear right now. Instead of asking what is the harm of a small data center in the old mill, ask: Does our community want the old mill site to become a permanent data center hub, with growing demands for electricity, cooling, water, noise regulation, several types of pollution, and industrial infrastructure right next to homes, rivers, and wildlife?

The cluster strategy is mostly about qualifying more assets for Montana’s favorable Class 17 property tax rate, spreading shared power/fiber/cooling infrastructure across multiple buildings or tenants, and potentially creating enough taxable increment to justify local infrastructure financing. The isolated single-data-center model could still qualify if it independently meets the thresholds, but a Bonner cluster gives Krambu a stronger path to aggregate investment, infrastructure, and future expansion under the incentive framework. It should be clear that this company is not here to invest in the community, but in themselves; therefore an AI data center cluster is a clear future should we allow these permits to go through now.

It’s great to see our community rally against this “AI Factory” as the mysterious people of Krambu like to market it. We as Montanans do not welcome this industry and we do not want Bonner to become a data center cluster. Where there is one, there will be many, so let’s work to shut it down before it gains traction. 

 

Up Next

How will this affect: 
-Residents 500 feet away

-Kettlehouse amphitheater 500 yards away

-Blackfoot River 250 yards away

Noise/Light pollution and how it affects wildlife
What the nearby residents of data centers currently experience in other states