ESSEX, Ill. – It’s been two days since we first told you about Constellation Energy buying several hundred acres of land in or near the Village of Essex and it’s still anyone’s guess what they are going to do with all of that land.

Fox Chicago’s Unit 32 brought you this story and our Bret Buganski is still on the hunt for some answers.

“My thought is, well, I think we lost our butts and our house because we bought it at the premium golf course price and now we are essentially could be having a data center in our backyard,” Essex resident Taylor Gunier said.

Gunier and her family moved into this house last summer.

She has spent the last year working with other concerned residents to figure out what Constellation is going to do with the 700 acres of land they have purchased in and around Essex from June 2025 to February 2026.

Data center in Essex?

The backstory:

Following a Freedom of Information request to the Kankakee County Recorder, a Unit 32 investigation found Constellation spent $47.5 million dollars in fourteen different land deals.  

Property records reviewed by Fox Chicago show the company purchased at least 505 acres in just nine months. The total is likely higher because some of the public records did not include the number of acres sold each time.
Unit 32 also found that two Essex Village Board members were sellers in five of those transactions.

“Essex does not have any industrial zoning ordinances, which I think is part of why Constellation chose us. We would have been an easy target with few regulations for them to abide by,” said Essex resident Kylee Raney.

Raney is part of the Essex Coalition, a group of concerned residents following every move between the Essex Village Board and Constellation Energy.

It has also been making some of its own moves.

“We’ve worked with a third party consultant and we have built out a draft of industrial zoning ordinances. They are based off of the Kankakee County industrial zoning ordinances along with some ordinances from Yorkville and the data center that is being built there. So we made sure to keep the language broad so it could cover a multitude of industrial uses, but we wanted to make sure the umbrella of that language included data centers. So we have a petition and we have doubled the numbers of our signatures there. The petition is to urge our village board members to pass industrial zoning ordinances. Even if you don’t know what they’re gonna build, even if Constellation doesn’t have their customer yet, you can put protections, legal protections, legally binding protections in place to ensure that we can mitigate noise pollution, sound pollution, we can monitor water usage. There are lots of avenues that we can take to build out the regulations to protect our future. No matter what happens,” Raney said.

While Raney says Constellation has not told them what they’re going to use the land for, the village board seems to be taking precautions for a data center.

On their website, the Essex Village Board wrote it “… has issued a formal notice establishing development standards and mitigation requirements for a proposed data center facility that may be located within the village.”

It also posted a letter. The subject line says it is a notice about “development standards and required mitigation response plan” for a data center.

What they’re saying:

“Now, as far as buying that big land in Illinois, there could be multiple reasons. I don’t know what they’re going do with it,” said Mohammad Shahidapur, a distinguished professor of electrical and computer engineering at the Illinois Institute of Technology.

Shahidapur has been teaching for 43 years.

Given his background, we asked him for his objective opinion as to what Constellation could be doing with all of this land. 

“They could be building a big solar farm because having a nuclear unit, we can sort of reduce the issues because sun doesn’t shine all the time. So then once the sun is shining, you know, basically, they can sell that and then when the sun is not shining they can replace it by nuclear. That could be one reason. They could be also going after data centers in a sense maybe they’re lining up with some of these tech companies to build more data centers and providing power through their nuclear units, so it’s sort of a joint venture,” Shahidapur said

The statement Constellation sent us when our story first aired says in part: “Constellation is seeking to annex land into Essex near the Braidwood Clean Energy Center to help the company strategically market the facility’s carbon-free generation to potential future developers.”

“So, obviously, I’m not an insider at the company, but if I’m a betting man, I would bet based on buying a bunch of land, looking to annex it, that they’re looking to build out one of these data centers,” said Andrew Rocco, a stock strategist with Zacks Investment Research based in Chicago.

Rocco’s focus is on the tech industry and where it overlaps with the energy sector.

So we also asked him for his unofficial analysis on what he thinks Constellation may do with the 700 acres of land they purchased in and around Essex:

“Braidwood is the largest nuclear plant in Illinois. And as I mentioned before, getting these nuclear facilities through the regulatory red tape, even though kind of the Trump administration has said they’re pro-nuclear, but still there’s a ton of regulatory red tape and really nothing has been approved in the last 10 or 20 years. So having this already built out, I think it does around 2,400 megawatts of carbon-free baseload electricity. So this is exactly what these large tech companies are looking for. They’re looking for an immense amount of energy, dependable and clean. Now you can look at natural gas as an alternative to something like this, because obviously the startup costs are going to be lower for natural gas. And natural gas is very, very cheap. And it makes up the most amount of energy produced in the U.S. currently. But once you have a nuclear reactor already running, this one’s been running since the late 80s, you don’t have to worry about that. So the upfront costs have already been paid for. Now they’re looking likely to secure this large plot of land nearby to put a data center in and just connect it right up to that massive nuclear plant.”

Again — that is Rocco’s unofficial opinion on what Constellation may be doing with all that land.

Unit 32 reached out to Constellation to see if they would tell us what was going to happen with all of the land they bought in and around Essex. They told us that since they do not have a customer, they do not have any plans.

BOLINGBROOK, Ill. (WLS) — Dozens of southwest suburban residents and lawmakers voiced opposition Tuesday night to Illinois American Water’s proposed $142 million rate increase during an Illinois Commerce Commission hearing in Bolingbrook.

Nearly every speaker during the first hour of the hearing spoke against the proposal, with many concerns centered on affordability and the impact of higher utility costs on families and seniors.

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Bolingbrook Mayor Mary Alexander-Basta urged regulators to reject the request.

“Water is not a luxury. It is not optional. It is a basic human necessity,” Alexander-Basta said.

Illinois American Water President Rebecca Losli defended the proposal, saying additional revenue is needed to support infrastructure improvements.

“We do this because of our customers. We are investing in this because of you. We want less water main breaks, and less constructions, less water boil orders. Simply put, continuing to invest in our water infrastructure is critical to ensuring that we provide reliable service to all of you,” Losli said.

According to Illinois American Water, the proposed increase would add about $14 per month for a typical customer using 3,500 gallons of water. Wastewater customers would see an increase of about $28 per month.

Several residents told regulators they are still feeling the effects of the utility’s previous rate increase. Pat Smith described changes she has made to reduce water use.

“I bathe twice a week now, instead of every day. I wear my clothes multiple times before washing,” Smith said. She later added, “This is unacceptable and the longer it goes the worse it’s going to get.”

Bolingbrook resident Michael Boyd also expressed concern about the proposal’s impact on customers.

“What concerns me is the frequency and size of the proposed increase and what it means for ordinary families who are already struggling,” Boyd said.

Several elected officials also called on the Illinois Commerce Commission to deny the request.

Illinois state Rep. Natalie Manley told attendees, “Just because it’s legal does not make it right.”

Alexander-Basta echoed that sentiment, saying, “Today, Bolingbrook is taking the lead in saying what people across the state have been saying for years: Enough is enough.”

Additional hearings in the case are scheduled for August. The Illinois Commerce Commission is expected to issue a final decision by Dec. 18.