Harford County, MD Data Centers & Crypto Mining: Data Center Zoning & Siting (2026)

Harford County Code § 267-8J, added to the zoning certificate article by Bill No. 26-011, forbids data centers everywhere in the county's zoning code, unincorporated Harford County included, without carving out an exception for the AG, industrial (LI, GI) or business districts that normally host large commercial buildings. The section supplies its own definition: a data center is a building or group of buildings where a substantial portion of the space houses computer systems, computer storage equipment, networking systems and the associated infrastructure that individuals or entities use to organize, process, store and disseminate large volumes of data, frequently for a fee.

Because the ban sits inside § 267-8, the article covering zoning certificates, it functions as an absolute use restriction enforced the moment an applicant seeks the zoning certificate required before any building permit, event permit or change of use can be approved: the Director of Planning cannot issue a certificate for a use the code itself prohibits. The prohibition applies countywide, covering every zoning district established under Article III of Chapter 267, from AG and the residential RR/R1-R4/VR districts through the B1-B3 business districts and the CI, GI, LI and MO industrial and mixed-use districts.

There is no variance or special exception pathway written into this subsection, so a proposed data center would have to seek a text amendment from the County Council rather than administrative relief from the Board of Appeals.