Oppidan is planning to develop a data center in Reno, Nevada.

As reported by News4, Oppidan last week successfully appealed to the Reno City Council to get approval for the project.

Oppidan had filed for a 61,500 sq ft (5,715 sqm), 5MW data center on seven acres along the north side of North Virginia Street on the east of its intersection with Stead Boulevard. The facility will use evaporative cooling.

The Reno Planning Commission had denied the company’s request in January in a 4-2 vote. Oppidan affiliate CLOP Reno NV LLC appealed, saying the commission’s decision was “arbitrary and capricious while failing to adhere to the established criteria and findings required under the Reno municipal code.”

The city council unanimously voted to overturn the planning commission’s decision.

Minnesota-based Oppidan is a property development firm. Its data center clients in the past have reportedly included Oracle, several unnamed telcos, Bell Canada brand Bell Alliant, and Sabey Corp.

It has been involved with projects in Memphis, Tennessee; an AWS project in California; and in 2022 acquired four plots in Santa Clara alongside Harrison Street set to be developed into a 50MW data center.

Oppidan recently filed to build a 5MW facility in El Paso, Texas, and broke ground on a 90,000 sq ft (8,360 sqm) data center in Chicago, Illinois. It also has projects in Eagan and Apple Valley, Minnesota.

On its website, Oppidan now lists a subsidiary known as Connect Data Centers. The recently formed unit says it has delivered data centers totaling 650MW and 2.28 million sq ft (211,819 sqm) across California, Virginia, Maryland, Tennessee, Ohio, Iowa, and Kansas since 2016. It says it has a further 720MW and 2.96 million sq ft (274,993 sqm) worth of projects in development across the US.

The Reno Planning Commission last month voted to recommend that the city place a temporary pause on filing and issuing permits for data centers while officials try to better understand the economic and environmental impact such facilities have on the local area. The council recently failed to update city regulations to include more rules around data centers.

Another data center project from Ellis Partners, known as the Webb Data Center, is being proposed nearby and has faced local opposition.