The plan to turn the former Androscoggin paper mill in Jay, Maine, into an AI data center is back. The Bangor Daily News reported that the owner, JGT2 Redevelopment, filed two permit applications with Maine’s Department of Environmental Protection on 9 November, five months after the project was put on hold. The plan first made public in March was a $550 million data center occupying 1 million square feet.
Developer Tony McDonald told the paper the data center would draw power from an existing 82-megawatt contract the mill held. By our arithmetic, that is 4.1 times the 20 MW line in a data center moratorium that runs until May 2027 in neighbouring Androscoggin County, which DatacenterDynamics reports the mill site borders.
Business Pill · Grid Cost Allocation
An evergreen Business Engineer explainer on who pays for new grid capacity, the ratepayer question behind data center politics. It teaches the general idea only and does not discuss Jay.
The key insight: As we read it, the Jay project is testing whether reuse can get a data center through a backlash: an old mill, an existing 82 MW power contract the developer says it holds, and a shared-tenant model, filed weeks before a governor who has said she would sign a ban takes office.
The site application would allow part of the former mill to be redeveloped into a data center, reusing existing paper mill buildings to hold computing equipment, the Maine Monitor account of the public notice says. The parking lot and rail yard would hold HVAC equipment, and a subsurface wastewater system would be built for sanitary sewer.
The air permit covers two diesel standby generators for emergency power. Maine Public and DatacenterDynamics put them at 3.25 megawatts each, or 6.5 MW together by our arithmetic. McDonald says one application amends the mill’s existing permit and would cover the mill and 93 adjacent residential properties the former owners bought over the years.
Maine Public reports the filing says JGT2 took care to “follow the council’s draft recommendations”, meaning a state Data Center Advisory Council set up by Gov. Janet Mills, which is due to report to lawmakers early next year.
Megawatts in the Jay, Maine refiling: the mill’s existing 82 MW power contract, as the developer describes it, against the 20 MW threshold of the Androscoggin County moratorium and two 3.25 MW standby generators. The 4.1x and 6.5 MW are our arithmetic. Sources: Bangor Daily News, Maine Public, DatacenterDynamics.
The Customer Model and the Water
McDonald told the BDN that Sentinel Data Centers has since signed a new customer and that the companies never stopped working on the project. Maine Public reports JGT2 intends to enter into an agreement with Sentinel to reuse the mill space. The data center would use what he calls “neo compute”, in which 100 or more smaller customers share the facility instead of one giant such as Amazon or Microsoft.
The original design called for 300,000 gallons of water per day, which McDonald said was about 1% of what the paper mill used. He said the redesigned closed-loop system uses 260,000 gallons that are reused constantly, with the first fill likely coming from the Jay Water District rather than the Androscoggin River.
Data center-related ballot measures in 10 states on 3 November 2026: 40 of 41 sided with greater restrictions. Source: Ballotpedia, as cited by CNBC.
The Politics Changed Since April
Mills vetoed a temporary statewide ban on new data centers in April and cited the Jay project when she did. Her successor, Gov.-elect Hannah Pingree, has said she would sign a ban. On 10 November she said Jay should not be “the testing ground” for data centers before Maine has strong regulations in place, adding: “Jay deserves good jobs and investment at the mill site, but not at the cost of ratepayers, neighbors or the environment”.
At least eight more Maine towns approved data center bans in the 3 November election; Jay does not have one. Nationally, CNBC reports, citing Ballotpedia, that voters sided with greater restrictions on data centers in 40 of 41 ballot measures in 10 states. Our coverage of the Texas freeze pledge and of Fairfield’s 45-day freeze tracks the same shift.
A request for a public hearing must be made to the DEP in writing within 20 days after it accepts the applications. A public meeting is tentatively scheduled for 10 December at the mill site.
The Structural Read
As we read the filing as reported, the developer is building its case on what already exists: existing mill buildings, the mill’s existing permit and the mill’s power contract, rather than a new grid connection.
As we read the politics, the same project that Mills cited when she vetoed the April ban is now the first test case for her successor, who said Jay should not be “the testing ground”.
Gov.-elect Hannah Pingree, in a statement reported by the Bangor Daily News, 10 November 2026
“Jay deserves good jobs and investment at the mill site, but not at the cost of ratepayers, neighbors or the environment”
Three Implications
FOR DEVELOPERS Maine Public reports the filing says JGT2 tried to follow the state advisory council’s draft recommendations as closely as possible, before any rules exist.
FOR THE TOWN The mill employed more than 1,000 people before it closed in 2023; McDonald says the data center would bring jobs and property tax revenue.
FOR THE TIMELINE A hearing request window of 20 days opens once the DEP accepts the applications, and a public meeting is tentatively set for 10 December.
The framework argues: “The structural bottleneck isn’t computing, it’s electrons.”
As we read it, an old mill’s existing 82 MW contract is the kind of electrons a developer can bring without a new grid fight, and the local vote is now the second bottleneck. The framework predates this filing and does not discuss Jay.
What Is Not Established
The reports we read do not give a current dollar figure or square footage for the revived plan; the $550 million and 1 million square feet come from the March plan. They do not name Sentinel’s new customer, and they do not say whether the Androscoggin County moratorium would apply to a site in Franklin County. Maine Public reported that McDonald did not immediately respond to its request for comment.
This Week In The AI Supercycle
The Great Convergence of Capital, Power, and Geopolitics
This week’s issue: for two years the AI build-out was priced as a supply story, and last week as a credit story. This week it was priced as a permission story, and the answer arrived as a cost, not a ban.
JGT2 has refiled state permits to put an AI data center in the former Jay paper mill on the mill’s existing 82 MW power contract, the developer says, weeks before a Legislature with larger Democratic majorities and a governor who has said she would sign a ban take over.
A note on sourcing. We read the Bangor Daily News reports of 9 and 10 November 2026 as published by The Maine Monitor, Maine Public’s report of 9 November and DatacenterDynamics’ report of 11 November, plus CNBC’s 11 November report for the Ballotpedia count. We did not read the DEP applications themselves. Power, water and customer details are the developer’s, as reported. The 4.1x and 6.5 MW figures are our arithmetic. We did not contact JGT2 or Sentinel.
Gennaro Cuofano is a CRO and tech executive who has worked in AI since late 2015, starting with bringing NLP, natural-language generation, voice and chatbot products to the marketing industry. His background is in law and finance: he holds a Master's degree in Law and an International MBA with an emphasis on corporate finance (LUISS Business School and the University of San Diego, 2012), and worked as a financial analyst at a real-estate investment firm in San Diego and as an assistant controller. His work focuses on business model strategy, business engineering and, more broadly, structural analysis: how companies make money, read from their own filings. He created FourWeekMBA and leads research there and at The Business Engineer, his newsletter on AI and business strategy, with over 95,000 subscribers and more than 1,000 published analyses. His writing has also appeared on Entrepreneur (for example, How to Digitize a Family Business in Europe) and HackerNoon. Find him on LinkedIn and Substack. See how we source.
