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Google’s $600 million expansion announcement in The Dalles, Oregon, dates to September 26, 2013. It described planned investment—not a verified final construction cost—and the local enterprise-zone agreement required a minimum investment of $200 million and 10 jobs. The available records do not establish the final cost, the precise completed facility tied to that announcement, or its realized job total.
What Google announced in 2013
Google said it would spend $600 million to expand its data-center campus in The Dalles. Data Center Knowledge reported that the announcement would bring Google’s investment in the town to $1.2 billion since 2005. The company’s operations manager, Dave Karlson, said, “We’re excited to expand our presence in The Dalles.” Data Center Knowledge’s September 26, 2013 report also quoted Oregon Governor John Kitzhaber calling the investment “great news.”
The article reported that Google had filed plans for a 164,000-square-foot data center on a 37-acre property. It said the $600 million announcement suggested expansion beyond that one facility then on the books. That was the report’s inference about the announcement’s scope, not confirmation of a final construction plan.
How the $600 million figure differed from the local agreement
The second enterprise-zone agreement described in the 2013 report required Google to invest at least $200 million and create 10 jobs. The reported $600 million announcement was three times that minimum, but an announced amount and a contractual floor are different measures; neither establishes the project’s final spending or employment.
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| Figure | What it refers to | Qualification |
|---|---|---|
| $600 million | Google’s announced expansion in 2013 | Announcement amount; final realized project cost is not established by the cited report. |
| $200 million | Minimum investment in the second enterprise-zone agreement | Contractual minimum reported in 2013, not the announced expansion total. |
| 10 jobs | Job commitment in that agreement | Stated commitment, not a verified realized job count attributable to the 2013 announcement. |
| $1.2 million upfront; $800,000 annually | Community payments reported under the agreement | The 2013 report described an upfront payment and annual payments while the agreement was in effect. |
Later projects are not proof of the 2013 plan’s final scope
Google’s location page says its first data center in The Dalles opened in 2006 and that it began building a fourth there in 2015. A separate 2021 Business Oregon packet described two later Strategic Investment Program projects near existing facilities. For each, the packet listed an initial potential scale of 200,000–400,000 square feet, $600 million in total investment, and 10 new Google employees. It expected Project 1 to begin construction in 2022 and operate in 2024; Project 2 had no set start date.
Those state-packet estimates concern later projects, not confirmation of what the 2013 $600 million announcement ultimately built or cost. The reviewed records do not map a specific completed facility, final expenditure, or realized job total directly to the 2013 announcement. The Business Oregon packet should therefore be read separately from the contemporaneous announcement.
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Investment figures have changed scope
Google’s current data-center location page reports more than $7 billion invested in Oregon since its first The Dalles data center opened in 2006. Google’s 2025 economic-impact methodology includes historical data-center construction as well as capital spending on servers and networking infrastructure. That statewide, broader-scope figure is not a direct update to the 2013 report’s $1.2 billion figure for investment in The Dalles since 2005.
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Water use and the community water project
Water has become part of the local discussion around data-center growth. OPB reported that city records showed Google used 383.9 million gallons in The Dalles in 2023 and 434.4 million gallons in 2024. Its January 23, 2026 follow-up also documented corrections and disputes about earlier coverage, the city’s water planning, and the relationship between water infrastructure and Google’s projects.
OPB clarified that Google transferred only part of a former aluminum smelter property’s water rights to the city, not all of them. It also reported that Google was not identified as the “unnamed industrial user” in the city’s 2024 water master plan; the city’s retired public works director made that point in a letter, and OPB said its article had not speculated about the future user’s identity. OPB corrected an error concerning projected water-rate increases; the corrected city-plan projection it cited was a 99% increase by 2036. These qualifications are important when describing the local water debate.
Separately, Google announced on October 22, 2025, that it had completed an aquifer storage and recovery system with the city. The company says the system stores rain-season water that might otherwise run off for use in drier months, provides the community with over 100 million additional gallons annually, and was permanently transferred to the city along with associated groundwater rights. Those are Google’s descriptions of the project. Google’s announcement gives its account; OPB’s follow-up covers the reporting corrections and local context.
Quick Recap
What the record establishes—and what it does not
- Established: Google announced a $600 million expansion in The Dalles in September 2013, and the local agreement reported at the time set a $200 million minimum investment and 10-job commitment.
- Not established in the reviewed records: the final cost of the 2013 plan, the exact completed facility or facilities attributable to it, and the number of jobs ultimately created specifically by it.
- Keep separate: the 2021 state-packet estimates for two later projects, Google’s current statewide investment figure with a broader accounting scope, and the company’s 2025 description of a community water project.
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