Jackson County, Missouri

County ranked by announced AI data-center load

1.2 GW Announced AI load

Campuses

Lead operator

Nebius

Resi rate Δ (Evergy)

+5.8%

Home price Δ (3y)

+10.7%

Property tax Δ (3y)

+11.5%

Population (2024 ACS)

720K

Median HH income (2024 ACS)

$68,577

Key takeaways

Jackson County contains both Kansas City and Independence and is home to 717,021 residents. The two announced campuses (Nebius at 1.2 GW and a Google Kansas City build) will share Evergy's grid with 1.14 million existing jobs.Source: Census ACS 2023 B01003 + sources[0] (Wikipedia: Jackson County, MO) + data/sites/data_centers.csv
Evergy Metro Missouri residential rates rose 3.0% from 13.3 to 13.7 cents per kWh between 2021 and 2023, adding about $44 per year to a typical household bill. The Missouri PSC has not yet ruled on cost-allocation for the Nebius Independence load.Source: data/cache/utility_rate_yoy.csv (Evergy Metro, MO)
Independence, Missouri is the second city in Jackson County with 121,944 residents and a median household income of $59,480. Northrop Grumman is the largest non-public employer there at 1,722 jobs, a baseline Nebius could match with a single training campus.Source: Census ACS 2023 B01003, B19013 + sources[0] (Wikipedia: Independence, MO)
Home prices rose 10.7% and property tax assessments rose 11.5% over three years, both well above local wage growth. The Jackson County assessor's office faced a class-action lawsuit over the 2023 reassessment cycle, which preceded the AI announcements.Source: data/cache/realestate_yoy.csv + data/cache/property_tax_yoy.csv (FIPS 29095)

41.2% of Jackson County households rent rather than own, the highest renter share in this batch outside of Union NJ. Median gross rent is $1,151 a month, so a 10% rent move from data-center wage pressure would cost the typical renter household about $1,380 a year.Source: Census ACS 2023 B25003, B25064 (FIPS 29095)
13.8% of Jackson County residents live below poverty against a 22.5% Black population share. The Nebius and Google campuses sit on Evergy lines that cross some of the most concentrated poverty in metropolitan Kansas City.Source: Census ACS 2023 B17001, B02001 (FIPS 29095)
Only 86.4% of Jackson County residents lived in the same house one year earlier, the second-lowest residential stability in this batch behind Cass ND. Kansas City is a transient labor market by AI county standards.Source: Census ACS 2023 B07001 (FIPS 29095)
36,245 Jackson County adults are veterans, 6.6% of the adult population. Whiteman Air Force Base sits 70 miles east and the regional Kansas City VA Medical Center anchors a labor pool with security clearances directly relevant to hyperscaler hiring.Source: Census ACS 2023 B21001 (FIPS 29095)