[WEEKENDER] ‘Why not Gangnam?’: Data center boom fuels fear in neighborhoods kept in the dark

About 20 people gather every morning in front of Geumcheon District Office in southwestern Seoul, holding signs and staging protests. Most are in their 50s and 60s and live in a large apartment complex identified only as “L,” home to more than 1,700 households. Their protest, which they say is the first demonstration they have ever taken part in, marked its 203rd consecutive day on Sept. 21. They might be expected to be tired by now, but it is anger rather than fatigue that shows on their faces.

The protesters are vehemently opposed to a data center. About 100 meters from the entrance to their apartment complex, construction of an eight-story data center has been underway for 11 months. Ko Young-chan, 33, a two-term member of the Geumcheon District Council who lives in L Apartment, said, “It seems data center developers came here thinking, ‘Land prices in a place like Geumcheon District make the project worth trying.'” He also claimed that the data center itself would not generate tax revenue for the district.

The situation is not unique to Geumcheon District. Data center projects are facing opposition from residents all around the Seoul metropolitan area. Data centers, which were once mainly located in industrial complexes, are now moving into semi-industrial areas next to apartment complexes.

Residents understand that data centers are essential infrastructure in the age of artificial intelligence. They are not facilities that everyone instinctively dislikes, such as garbage incinerators, prisons or crematoriums. Yet opposition has been just as fierce.

The central question is, “Why does it have to be right in front of my home, and why are you building it without telling us?” The situation in the United States, where data center projects have been halted amid resident opposition and have even emerged as major election issues, no longer seems so distant from Korea.

Concerns over electromagnetic waves and noise

Why do developers insist on building data centers in the densely populated Seoul metropolitan area? The answer is speed.

Data centers transmit enormous amounts of data in real time. The closer they are to users, the lower the “latency,” or transmission delay, allowing data to travel back and forth more quickly. The Seoul metropolitan area has an advantage because its power and telecommunications networks are densely developed. Related personnel are also concentrated in Seoul, Gyeonggi Province and Incheon, allowing operators to respond quickly when problems occur. This is why more than 60 percent of the country’s 165 data centers are located in the metropolitan area.

But residents who suddenly find an unfamiliar building just beyond their apartment walls are worried. They claim data centers could pose various risks. Some fear that high-voltage power lines supplying electricity could emit electromagnetic waves harmful to health. Others worry that large cooling facilities operating around the clock to cool servers will generate heat and noise. Some residents are also concerned that an energy storage system (ESS) could cause a major fire.

A resident in his 60s who lives in an apartment in Doksan-dong said, “I saw news reports from overseas about problems caused by data center noise and electromagnetic waves. It was frightening, and I felt betrayed. Honestly, isn’t it more harmful than an ordinary factory that emits smoke?”

The district office has received about 400 complaints from residents related to electromagnetic waves, noise and other issues before and after construction of the data center. Some nearby residents have also pointed out that “the road directly in front of the site is only a 6-meter-wide alley,” raising concerns that “even one fire engine wouldn’t be able to get in properly if a fire broke out.”

The government and industry have argued that there is no reason for concern. They say that most data centers in the metropolitan area are relatively small facilities that do not require new high-voltage transmission lines. In September last year, the Ministry of Science and ICT, together with the Korea Communications Agency, measured electromagnetic waves from high-voltage cables at six data centers and found that levels at all six sites were about 1 percent of the human safety standard.

“Concerns about electromagnetic waves and noise are largely based on vague fears,” said Chae Hyo-geun, executive vice president of the Korea Data Center Federation. “Noise and fires are matters that can be managed, and because data centers are designed under strict safety standards, they can actually be safer than ordinary buildings.”

Residents, however, remain unconvinced.

Data centers take root next to apartment complexes

One of the biggest complaints from residents is the distance between the facilities and their homes. They say data centers are being built too close to residential areas.

Juam District in Gwacheon, Gyeonggi Province, is a case in point. Plans are underway to build data centers on five lots designated for business facilities. According to residents, the site is only 25 meters from a new apartment complex scheduled to be occupied in September 2028 and about 90 meters from an apartment complex in Seoul’s Seocho District across Yangjae Stream. Residents claim that more than 5,000 households will eventually live within a 500-meter radius of the planned site.

The situation is similar in Siksa-dong in Ilsan, Goyang, Gyeonggi Province. A data center is planned on a 27,000-square-meter site, roughly the size of four soccer fields.

“The distance between the data center and the apartment complex boundary is only 54 meters. There is also an elementary school with 1,000 students less than 200 meters away,” said Kang Sun-mo, head of the emergency committee opposing the data center in Siksa-dong.

“We’re not saying data centers shouldn’t be built. We’re saying they shouldn’t be built right next to where people live.”

He said residents would have little reason to object if the facilities were planned at an appropriate distance from residential areas.

The Siksa-dong data center project applied for a construction permit in September 2024. Reviews by the Goyang City Urban Planning Committee and Building Committee passed conditionally last year, but construction has yet to begin amid opposition from residents.

A Goyang City official said, “Given the strong opposition from residents, we plan to reflect their concerns as much as possible.”

‘We didn’t even know it was being built’

Another source of residents’ anger is what they describe as a lack of transparency in the administrative process. They say they did not know a data center was coming until construction began.

A resident identified only as A in Doksan-dong said, “The construction noise was so bad that I asked the district office about it, and they initially told me a broadcasting and communications facility was being built. I vaguely thought it was something like a broadcasting station. I never dreamed it was a data center that would consume so much electricity.”

The district office’s explanation was not technically incorrect. Under the current Building Act, data centers are classified as “broadcasting and communications facilities.” Even facilities located in semi-industrial areas may be subject to a preliminary notice procedure for building permits, under which residents’ opinions are collected when they are adjacent to apartment complexes, schools, day care centers or other facilities and could affect the residential environment.

Data centers, however, are not subject to that procedure. In other words, a data center could potentially appear one day next to the apartment where you live without residents being informed in advance.

Resident briefings and public hearings are also not mandatory. According to the office of Rep. Park Ji-hye of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea, only 26 of the 112 data centers nationwide that have been completed or are under construction — 23.2 percent — have held a resident briefing or public hearing at least once.

“A building permit is, in principle, a bound administrative act that local governments are required to issue when the necessary requirements are met,” said Choi In-chun, an adjunct professor of architectural engineering at Yonsei University.

“Although authorities can request supplementary measures at the stage of reporting the start of construction in response to complaints, there is no procedure for hearing residents’ opinions before construction begins.”

Some also view concerns over property values as the underlying reason for the opposition. Residents themselves do not hide their frustration that data centers are being built in relatively less-developed areas of the metropolitan region rather than expensive and affluent neighborhoods such as Gangnam, potentially widening existing disparities in property prices.

In areas where conflicts over data centers are particularly intense, including Geumcheon District in Seoul and Goyang and Gimpo in Gyeonggi Province, residents commonly believe their neighborhoods have already been left behind in the rise in housing prices.

One Doksan-dong resident said, “I heard that even if I sold my 35-pyeong (115.7-square-meter) apartment here, I could barely afford a 25-pyeong (82.6-square-meter) older apartment in Cheolsan-dong, Gwangmyeong. Prices are rising everywhere else, but not here.”

Chain of risks: Complaints, construction delays and lawsuits

Developers building data centers are frustrated as well. Even after obtaining building permits early on, they face construction delays as well as the costs of administrative and legal disputes.

“We used our own money to conduct simulations with experts and research institutes and shared the results at a public hearing, showing that the impact of electromagnetic waves and equipment noise on nearby apartments was minimal. But it made no difference,” an official from a developer pursuing a data center project in Seoul said.

“Even when we explain that the facility is small and will have virtually no environmental impact, residents perceive data centers as extremely dangerous, gigantic factories.”

For developers, time is money. Even a delay of several months can cause loan interest and other costs to snowball.

Data centers are generally developed by specialized developers or asset managers that secure land and power, obtain permits and handle resident complaints. Once construction is complete, they sell the facility to an operating company and make a profit on the difference.

Construction delays are, of course, common in other real estate development projects as well. But industry officials say data centers are particularly vulnerable to cascading cost increases when schedules go off track.

“General commercial properties are designed flexibly from the outset because they are intended to accommodate multiple tenants. Data centers, however, are facilities with a very specific purpose,” another developer said.

“Everything from power to cooling is interconnected, so if even one stage falls out of alignment, it affects everything else down the line.”

Calls are growing for institutional reforms to resolve conflicts arising from data center projects. In particular, there is growing support for a legal framework specifically designed for data centers.

As data centers are expected to spread beyond the Seoul metropolitan area and across the country, experts say conflicts cannot be resolved by relying on the same formulas used for ordinary building permits. Otherwise, disputes over responsibility among developers, local residents and local governments are likely to continue.

“The most urgent task is to fill the institutional gap created by forcing data centers into the outdated category of broadcasting and communications facilities and leaving each conflict to local government ordinances,” said Ji Ju-hyung, a professor of sociology at Kyungnam University.

“Now that data centers have become a key part of national infrastructure policy, we need a special law that establishes a single framework covering everything from location and safety standards to information disclosure and conflict management.”

This article by Jo A-reum and Kang Ji-su of the Hankook Ilbo, the sister publication of The Korea Times, was translated by a generative AI system and edited by The Korea Times.