The desolate dead-end terminus of Locke Road consists of a gravel path, shrubbery, tree stumps and a lonely white armoire, abandoned and out of place.
And soon, perhaps, a micro data center.
Northpoint Engineering, LLC, a Concord-based engineering firm, is requesting that the city of Concord approve a major site plan and architectural design review for 52 Locke Road, where landowner Granite Municipal Manufacturing & Sales, LLC is proposing to build an 8,160-square-foot building to house a “micro-data center, office, garage and single residential caretaker unit.”
Approximately 7,220 square feet of that footprint would be utilized as data center space.
Northpoint describes the development as “a small-scale data processing facility containing computer servers and related electronic equipment used to provide computing capacity and digital infrastructure services. Unlike traditional large-scale data center campuses, micro data centers occupy a relatively small footprint and are designed as compact, self-contained data processing facilities.”
Northpoint could not be reached for comment on this story.
The Concord Planning Board will make a determination “by consent” about the completion of the application at its Wednesday meeting, according to the board’s agenda. This means limited discussion will be heard on the item before the board takes its vote.
City staff has recommended that the board determine, affirmatively, that the application is complete, and that the project does not trigger the threshold for a development of regional impact. The board is urged to set a public hearing for mid-October, according to a staff report. If the board finds the application complete on Wednesday, it will have 60 days — or up until November 20 — to act on it and hold a hearing.
The parcel at 52 Locke Road is a stubborn piece of property. In 2015, a company called Fournier Foods dropped its plans to build a 5,500-square-foot poultry processing plant on the site after final construction costs exceeded initial estimates. The facility had already received Planning Board approval, despite strident opposition from neighbors.
Amy Manzelli, the company’s attorney, told the Monitor at the time that Fournier Foods was “deeply, deeply saddened by this decision.”
The erstwhile property owner, Jay W. Stewart Realty Holdings, LLC, was administratively dissolved and last filed federal tax reports in 2021, according to the Secretary of State’s business records database. That year, Puritan Press Inc., a Concord-based commercial printing company now known as Puritan Capital, of which Jay Stewart is vice president and co-owner, assumed ownership.
Current owner Granite Municipal Manufacturing & Sales LLC purchased the land in 2024. It is unclear whether, during Stewart’s more than 15 years of involvement with the property, it was ever envisioned as another kind of development.
Earlier this year, Granite Municipal proposed to convert the land into a light industrial flex and self-storage development. Three four-story buildings would house “flex industrial
bays on the first floor with three stories of self-storage units above,” while a fourth building would accommodate an office, maintenance garage and caretaker apartment, according to a project narrative.
The development was scheduled to appear before the Zoning Board of Adjustment as late as June, but by July, planning board meeting minutes reflect that Northpoint and Granite Municipal had requested to withdraw their application.
The micro data center proposal emerged in the few months since.
Data centers have garnered vociferous opposition nationwide for their environmental impact and toll on the energy grid.
Unlike the large data centers being built to power Artificial Intelligence and their rapacious demand for water to cool themselves, Northpoint explained in its project narrative that the proposed micro data center would utilize a “single-phase immersion cooling technology,” a closed-loop system that captures heat generated by computing equipment and transfers it “for beneficial reuse or dissipation” through heat exchangers.
The center will not require water for “normal cooling operations,” but comments from city staff indicate that the application includes a proposed six-inch water service. The section titled “Cooling System and Heat Recovery” in the applicant’s publicly available project narrative was blank, and the city has asked Northpoint to “detail scenarios in which water may be utilized.”
The firm preempted another environmental concern: The parcel totals nearly 21 acres of land, approximately 9.3 of which is buildable, bounded on both sides by protected wetlands.
In 2025, as well as during periods of previous ownership, portions of the wooded buffer surrounding these wetlands were clear-cut — comprising around 54,780 square feet of deforested land, which amounts to a little more than an acre. Northpoint has proposed a “revegetation and restoration” plan for these areas, including additional plantings of trees, shrubs and a “conservation seed mix,” according to the project narrative.
The Planning Board will convene at 7 p.m. on Wednesday, Sept. 16, at 37 Green Street in City Council chambers.
