We at Rolling Hills Veterinary Services oversee animal health in Dubuque County, as well as the adjacent Jackson, Jones, Delaware, and Clayton counties. We felt it was imperative that our input be given as animal agriculture is a key component to the livelihoods and way of life for the communities in these counties.

Datacenters are a new and unproven addition to any community they are built in. The revenue they provide is known, however, the long-term environmental impacts are still not very well understood. What is slowly being uncovered is the excessive noise pollution, water pollution, and energy usage that these data centers demand. As veterinarians, our expertise lies in the effects datacenters may have on animals in the area, both pets and food producing alike.

Water is the most important nutrient in an animal's diet. There have been reports of wastewater from these data centers containing chemicals designed to inhibit bacterial growth within the systems, chemicals designed to prevent corrosion of these pipelines, and excessive heavy metals from the interior of these systems such as zinc, lead, and copper. All of which can be toxic to both pets, food producing animals, and wildlife. A strong majority of our food producing livestock receives its water from a single stream and/or a single well from a shared aquifer. Any downstream pollutants or strain on resources that this datacenter might cause could be catastrophic to our communities. The inability to provide clean and safe drinking water for livestock could result in lost livelihoods, extreme animal suffering, significant wildlife losses, and inevitably litigation to the county responsible for providing clean water to its taxpayer residents, not to mention the catastrophic effects those pollutants may have on the Mississippi River itself, or, the communities downstream of Dubuque County.

Data centers have been known to produce noise levels of up to 96 decibels. Studies have shown that constant noise above 65 decibels can induce increased heart rates, blood pressure, and stress hormones in the blood while anything above 85 decibels can cause permanent damage to human ears. While we are not experts in human medicine, we do know that animals, including dogs, cats, cattle, swine, horses, sheep, goats, and wildlife have a greater ability to detect sound at a lower volume than humans, and, at much lower frequencies. This means that any sound we hear, they hear louder. It also means that they can hear sounds we are unable to perceive. There have been studies performed on dairies indicating that a decibel level greater than 65 can cause an increase in stress responses from the animals. While that may not always be a perfect number for every species, it can reasonably be assumed that consistent noise levels will increase stress levels in livestock surrounding any proposed datacenter. Stress hormones will deplete an animal's body of