Stutsman County, North Dakota

County ranked by announced AI data-center load

100 MW Announced AI load

Campuses

Lead operator

Applied Digital

Resi rate Δ (Otter Tail Power)

+9.3%

Home price Δ (3y)

n/a

Property tax Δ (3y)

+9.2%

Population (2024 ACS)

22K

Median HH income (2024 ACS)

$61,856

Key takeaways

Stutsman County is 21,525 residents centered on Jamestown, a city of 15,849 that was a Northern Pacific Railroad repair-yard town from 1872 until the 1960s. The economy now leans on precision manufacturing, food processing, and the Jamestown JMS01 HPC site.Source: Census ACS 2023 B01003 (FIPS 38093) + sources[0] (Wikipedia: Jamestown, ND)
Applied Digital's 100 MW Jamestown JMS01 went operational in 2024 and was the company's first North Dakota HPC site, predating the larger Polaris Forge campuses in Dickey and Cass counties. The 100 MW load is roughly 4.6 kW per Stutsman resident.Source: data/sites/data_centers.csv (Jamestown JMS01) + Census ACS 2023 B01003
Otter Tail Power's North Dakota residential rate rose 9.3% from 2021 to 2023 and the utility has only 45,467 residential customers statewide. Property tax assessments rose 9.2% over the same baseline on a $200,300 median home value.Source: data/cache/utility_rate_yoy.csv (Otter Tail Power Co, ND) + data/cache/property_tax_yoy.csv (FIPS 38093) + Census ACS 2023 B25077
Median household income is $60,172 and the median age is 40.6. 24.4% of adults hold a bachelor's degree, leaving Stutsman with a smaller technically-trained labor pool than Cass County 100 miles north.Source: Census ACS 2023 B19013, B01002, B15003 (FIPS 38093)

11.0% of Stutsman County workers are in manufacturing including Cavendish Farms potato processing in Jamestown. The 100 MW JMS01 site is competing for the same skilled-trades labor pool that staffs the Cavendish line.Source: Census ACS 2023 C24050 (FIPS 38093)
Unemployment is 3.6% and 12.4% of Stutsman residents live below poverty. The poverty rate is higher than Cass County 100 miles north despite the same Otter Tail Power rate environment.Source: Census ACS 2023 B23025, B17001 (FIPS 38093)
36.4% of Stutsman households rent rather than own, the highest renter share of any North Dakota AI host county. A small 100 MW hyperscaler load can move rents in a market this tight more visibly than the larger Cass or Dickey builds will.Source: Census ACS 2023 B25003 (FIPS 38093)
92.0% of Stutsman residents are white, 3.0% Hispanic, 2.1% Black, and 0.5% Asian. The University of Jamestown student body lifts the local diversity baseline above what the surrounding agricultural counties report.Source: Census ACS 2023 B02001, B03003 (FIPS 38093)