In the last post, we walked through the size of what is coming and what it could mean for local trades. Today, we go a level deeper. Who is actually building the industrial park? What has the county already put in writing? And where are the gaps in the public record that residents have a right to ask about?
Some of this is reassuring. Some of it raises real questions. Almost all of it is sitting in public records, press releases, and meeting minutes that nobody locally has pulled together in one place yet.
Who Is Potentia, Really?
The developer is Potentia Inc., headquartered in The Woodlands, Texas. The founder and CEO is Rich McCrea. The development arm that handles the construction-side deals is Potentia Development, run by Carl Quesinberry, whose entire prior career was at site selection and corporate real estate firms like Avison Young, CRESA, Cushman & Wakefield, and Grubb & Ellis. The chief commercial officer is Ilich Vahimi, who has shown up in our local coverage as the executive vice president for Heartland Development.
If you have read the WBIW or WIBC stories that called Potentia “U.K.-based,” that appears to be wrong. The company’s press releases are all datelined out of Texas, and the leadership team is American. Several Indiana outlets repeated the same mistake. Don’t let it confuse you.
Two other companies share the name and have nothing to do with our project. There is a Potentia Capital out of Sydney, Australia, that invests in software companies. There is a Potentia Renewables based in Toronto, owned by Power Corporation of Canada. Neither has anything to do with Heartland. If somebody tells you the project is funded by a Canadian renewable energy firm or an Australian PE firm, that is a different company with a similar name.
What We Know About Potentia’s Track Record
Not much yet, in fairness, and that is worth saying out loud.
The only prior public commercial relationship is a January 2025 deal with Hypertec Cloud, a Montreal company owned by the Ahdoot family. That deal gave Hypertec access to “more than 480 MW of power throughout 8 Potentia data center locations across North America.” At the time, Potentia’s website said a 150 MW Indiana data center would be operating in 2025. There is no public confirmation that facility is online. Whether the Hypertec 480 MW commitment includes Sullivan County capacity is a question for Potentia.
The only other Potentia project with an actual public announcement is Project Big Pine, unveiled on April 28, 2026 in Bowie County, Texas. It is a $3.5 billion data center campus partnered with TexAmericas Center, with about 120 permanent jobs projected. Same playbook as ours: skip the local incentives, focus on “speed-to-power,” promise a 24-to-30-month timeline.
When you hear that Potentia has a long track record of doing this, ask where. The public record shows Heartland is one of two announced projects, and neither is built yet.
Who Is Funding This?
This is where the public record stays quiet. The April 30, 2026 closing announcement, handled by the law firm Mintz LLP and led by attorney Joshua Rudin, confirms that an investment closed. It does not name the equity partners, the debt providers, or the limited partners. There is no SEC Form D filed for Potentia Inc. There is no PitchBook profile naming backers. The open record does not name the people writing the actual checks.
That is not necessarily a problem. Plenty of private deals do not disclose their investors. But on a $65 billion project, with this kind of impact on this county, the question of who Potentia really answers to is a fair one to ask on the record.
Who Is Building It?
This part will surprise some folks. Despite all the talk and the construction announcement, the public record does not name the prime general contractor or construction manager at Heartland Industrial Park.
What is on file:
The IDEM Construction Stormwater General Permit Notice of Intent, published in the Tribune-Star public notices on April 4, 2026, lists the project as “Project Nova – Phase 1.” The permittee is Heartland Industrial Park LLC, with an address at 3116 Bryn Mawr Drive, Dallas, Texas 75225. The site sits in Township 7 North, Range 10 West, Sections 10 through 15. Stormwater discharges into Turtle Lake and Turtle Creek Reservoir.
The engineering consultant of record on that filing is Stantec, a global engineering firm based in Edmonton, Alberta with a major office in Indianapolis. Stantec is also the firm that sent a representative to give the NDA-bound presentation to commissioners back in late March. Stantec is an engineer, not a contractor. They handle civil engineering and environmental permits. They do not pour concrete or run steel.
The Potentia website lists technology partners like Schneider Electric, JLL, Submer, Quanta, and Solvenz. The Quanta on that list is Quanta Computer (a Taiwanese server company), not Quanta Services (the U.S. utility construction firm). Different companies, similar names.
Common candidates for a prime on a job like this in the Midwest would be names like Mortenson, Turner, DPR, Holder, HITT, Clayco, Walsh, Walbridge, or Burns & McDonnell. Naming any of them as the Heartland prime without proof would be irresponsible. The way to find out for sure is one of these:
- A sign at the construction entrance off County Road 400 West and Old SR 54
- A township-level building permit
- A road-use bond filed with the county engineer
- An OSHA establishment record once mobilization is in full swing
- An updated IDEM filing as construction phases progress
When the prime contractor is finally named, that will tell us a lot. A regional builder with a record of using union halls in Indiana is a different story from an out-of-state design-build firm that travels its full crew.
What The County Signed
The commissioners have signed two documents with Heartland: a road-use agreement and a community enhancement agreement. Both were reported in late March 2026.
The community enhancement agreement, as described in the public reporting, breaks down like this:
- $25 million during Phase 1 construction
- $25 million during Phase 2 construction
- $4.5 million split between the Brown Baggers School Food Program, Sullivan County Park & Lake, and the College Hall Merom Camp & Retreat Center
- A 15-acre land donation for a fire station
That adds up to $54.5 million in promised community money. The first payment is reportedly expected this summer.
The road-use agreement, by all accounts, requires Heartland to document the condition of the roads before and after construction and to repair any damage they cause. That one has teeth. Road-use agreements are standard, they are enforceable, and the county has used them before.
The community enhancement agreement is harder to evaluate without seeing the full text. From the public reporting, the description sounds more like a pledge than a performance contract. Has anyone in the public actually read either document in full? I have not. Both should be posted on the county website, in PDF, so residents can read them with their own eyes. There is no good reason not to.
What The “No Tax Abatement” Story Actually Means – The Fine Print
You probably already know Potentia did not ask for or receive a county tax abatement. That holds up in the records. It is unusual, and it is also more strategic than residents might realize.
For Sullivan County, the upside is straightforward. Property tax revenue from this project will start hitting the rolls at full strength immediately. That is meaningfully bigger than any plausible abatement savings ever was. Under Indiana’s tax cap rules, the added assessed value should put downward pressure on tax rates for current taxpayers in Gill Township. That part is true.
For Potentia, skipping the abatement was probably the smartest move available. Asking for one would have triggered a Statement of Benefits process, public hearings, political risk, organized opposition, and probably a year of delay. Skipping it handed commissioners a clean talking point (“they didn’t ask for a dime”) that essentially shuts down a whole category of opposition before it can form.
There is a piece worth understanding that has not made it into local conversation yet. Indiana abatements under IC 6-1.1-12.1 are routinely conditioned on local-hire commitments and wage requirements, with claw-back provisions if those commitments are not met. By not taking an abatement, Potentia avoided every one of those strings.
So the trade is this. The county got full property tax revenue from day one. In exchange, the county gave up the leverage it would have had to enforce local hiring and wage standards inside the construction contracts. Not a conspiracy. Just contract law. No abatement means no claw-back stick to use later.
One footnote worth flagging. Indiana has a separate state-level Data Center Sales and Use Tax Exemption, administered by the Indiana Economic Development Corporation under IC 6-2.5-15. That program can run up to 50 years for investments over $750 million, and it is separate from any county abatement. Whether Potentia or its anchor tenant has applied for or received that state exemption is something I have not been able to confirm. The IEDC would be the place to ask.
Where The Local Labor Agreement Stands
In the late March commissioners’ meeting, the Sun Commercial reporting said Heartland has been “working on labor agreements with local labor unions.” That language is encouraging, but watch the verb. “Working on” is not “have signed.” Until those agreements are signed, named, and posted publicly, “working on” is just a verb.
Potentia’s website calls local hiring a “priority” and says residents will get “first access” to jobs. That language is non-binding. There is no number, no audit right, and no penalty disclosed.
A piece of state context most folks do not know: Indiana repealed its Common Construction Wage Act on July 1, 2015. We have not had a state prevailing wage requirement on private projects since then. Federal Davis-Bacon prevailing wage only applies if there is federal funding in the project, and there is no public indication that Heartland has any federal money in it. So there is no automatic prevailing wage floor on this construction. None.
That is not a pro-union or anti-union statement. It is just Indiana law. Whether Heartland uses prevailing wages, hires locally, or runs a Project Labor Agreement is entirely up to what is written into the contracts the developer signs with the prime and the subcontractors. Verbal commitments do not count. They evaporate. Always.
Tactics Big Developers Use
Big developers run a playbook. Most of them are not villains. They are running plays they have run a hundred times. Knowing the plays helps residents and trades push back from a position of information instead of surprise.
The loud tactics:
- Artificial deadlines. “We need this approved in 30 days or the tenant walks.”
- Going over local heads. State press releases, IEDC announcements, and gubernatorial photo-ops timed to upstage local hesitation. The “Silicon Heartland” branding is already being used.
- Site selectors playing bad cop. “Our client may have to look elsewhere.” Quesinberry’s whole prior career was in this exact role.
- NDA-bound presentations to elected officials. This already happened at the March meeting. NDAs shift information toward the developer, since the public cannot push back on what we do not get to see.
The quiet tactics matter even more, because that is where the real money decisions live:
- “Best efforts” or “good faith” local-hire language with no enforcement, no number, no audit right, and no penalty.
- Defining “local” so loosely that workers from Indianapolis, Cincinnati, Louisville, or Chicago count as local on paper.
- Specialty-work carve-outs that classify hyperscale electrical work, switchgear, UPS systems, immersion cooling, fiber, and generator commissioning as “specialty” or “proprietary” to justify traveling crews. This is industry-standard, and it eats most of the high-wage hours on a data center build.
- Per diem economics. A traveling pipefitter on a $135-a-day per diem effectively underbids a local worker who has no per diem. Not malicious. Just the math without enforcement.
- No published Project Labor Agreement.
- Counting suppliers as “local content.” A truck of concrete from a local plant matters, but it is not the same thing as local construction labor.
- H-2B visas and interstate labor brokers, which have shown up on solar farms in this region.
The county already has a useful precedent on this. On the Deriva/Greenboat solar project, local trades showed up at the commissioners’ meeting and pushed for written commitment to the “tri-trade agreement” with laborers, operators, and electricians. Commissioners tabled approval until they got the language in writing. That worked. The same approach on Heartland would mean a lot more than verbal pledges.
If trades and residents do not show up the same way, we should not be surprised when “we’ll work with local labor” turns into “well, we tried.”
What Happened At Other Indiana Data Center Jobs
Worth knowing what has played out recently on comparable Indiana builds, since they tell you what to watch for.
Meta’s $10 billion Lebanon, Indiana campus broke ground in February 2026. The contractor team is Mortenson and Turner, with Faith Technologies handling the electrical work. Peak construction workforce is projected at around 4,000. Meta took the state data center sales tax exemption.
Meta also has an $800 million campus in Jeffersonville, Turner-led.
The $832 million data center in Michigan City is the most relevant cautionary tale, and the details matter. The project is called Project Maize. Google is the tenant. The developer is Phoenix Investors out of Milwaukee, with Phoenix Services running the construction. International Union of Operating Engineers Local 150 has been picketing the site since the fall of 2025 over the use of out-of-state contractors and workers from Wisconsin, Ohio, Alabama, Texas, and Illinois. A worker fell from the roof in October 2024. The developer’s language about using local trades “within reason” became a flashpoint, and two Local 150 members were arrested for criminal trespass at the picket line in late October 2025. The developer filed a $2 million lawsuit against the union in November 2025.
Two things stand out about Michigan City for our purposes. The first is that Michigan City did give the project tax abatements (reported by the NWI Times at $42 million over 35 years), and the project still ended up with the Local 150 dispute. So having an abatement is not automatic protection, and not having one (our situation) is not automatic damage either. The second is that the dispute centered on exactly the kind of “within reason” language that should make local trades nervous about Heartland.
DC Blox has announced a $2 billion data center for Indianapolis.
When somebody says these projects always honor their local-hire promises, the answer in Michigan City was no.
Hallador Energy And The Merom Power Plant
Here is a piece that has not gotten as much local coverage as it should. Hallador Energy, a publicly traded company based in Terre Haute (Nasdaq ticker HNRG), owns the Merom Generating Station, the 1,080 MW coal-fired plant right next to the Heartland site. They bought it from Hoosier Energy in October 2022.
Hallador has been hunting for a data-center customer for that plant for over a year. In Q3 2024 they signed a non-binding term sheet with an unnamed “leading global data center developer.” On January 2, 2025 they signed a Conversion Transaction Commitment Agreement with up to $5 million in exclusivity payments over 105 business days. Inside INdiana Business reported in 2025 that the deal had stalled when “a third-party developer pulled out.”
As of late April 2026, there is no public confirmation that Potentia is or was the counterparty on that Hallador agreement. WIN Energy REMC has been named as a utility partner by both Hallador (separately) and Potentia, which is a circumstantial connector but not proof.
The question worth pressing is this: is Potentia the counterparty on Hallador’s January 2025 Conversion Transaction Commitment Agreement? If the answer is yes, this becomes a coal-powered AI data center story, which changes the environmental picture significantly. It would also help explain why Sullivan County ended up on Potentia’s map. Cheap, abundant power right next door is the kind of thing that makes a rural site make sense.
Hallador is a public company. The answer to the counterparty question exists in writing somewhere. Somebody in the press should ask.
Numbers To Watch Closely
Most of the headline figures (the $65 billion total investment, the 2,750 peak construction jobs, the 500 permanent jobs, the 60,000 gallons-per-day water use, the “no diesel backup generators” claim, the “no rate increase to residential WIN Energy customers” claim) all come from Potentia or from commissioners summarizing what Potentia told them. They might all turn out to be true. None of them is independently audited yet.
The 60,000 gallons-per-day “equivalent to 200 homes” figure is technically defensible if the closed-loop cooling system works as advertised. Closed-loop and immersion cooling use a lot less water than older evaporative cooling. But the 200-homes framing only counts cooling water. It does not count construction water, sanitation, fire suppression, or emergency makeup water. Indiana American Water has a service application on file for the project. That paperwork would tell the real total.
The 2,750 peak construction jobs is a peak number, not an average. Average employment over a multi-year build will be much lower. And as we said last time, Sullivan County does not have 2,750 IBEW journeyman electricians sitting on the bench. Some traveling trades are coming in. That is reality. The question is what percentage of the total hours, not whether any traveler is on site at all.
The 500 permanent jobs claim is the one to watch hardest. Operating data centers do not typically employ that many people. A 500 MW campus usually employs in the low hundreds, not 500. Take it at face value if you want, but ask for the breakdown when the time comes.
Where Critics Can Get It Wrong
Worth being fair on this. There is a version of the local critique on this project that goes too far, and getting that version wrong damages the case where the critique is legitimate.
Saying the project will hurt residential water supply: not really, at the published numbers, if closed-loop holds.
Saying property taxes will rise on residents because of Heartland: under Indiana tax caps, the added assessed value should actually put downward pressure on rates for existing taxpayers in Gill Township. Potentia has stated that correctly.
Saying Potentia is a Canadian renewable energy company or an Australian PE firm: they are not. Different companies with similar names.
Saying the Stantec engineer is the prime contractor: he is not. He is an engineer.
If the case for tougher terms on this deal is going to be made, it has to be made on the actual facts. Those facts are: opaque ownership, no signed PLA in the public record, “best efforts” language without numbers, no public text of the community enhancement agreement, and an anchor tenant still unnamed.
Questions Worth Asking At The Next Meeting
If you have three minutes at the public comment microphone, here is a starter list:
- Will the road-use and community enhancement agreements be posted in full on the county website?
- Has any agreement been signed with local trade unions yet, and if so, will it be made public?
- Who are Potentia’s equity partners, and where else have they built?
- Is Potentia the counterparty on Hallador’s January 2025 Conversion Transaction Commitment Agreement?
- Who is the prime contractor at the Heartland site?
- Who is the anchor tenant?
Six questions. Each one has a written answer somewhere, sitting in a contract, an SEC filing, or a county file.
Where That Leaves Us
This project is real. The road-use agreement and the community enhancement payments are real concessions, and the road-use agreement in particular has actual teeth. The skipped tax abatement is also real, and it cuts both ways. Property tax revenue from day one is a benefit. The loss of local-hire claw-back leverage is a cost.
The opacity around ownership, prime contractor, anchor tenant, and labor agreements is also real. Those answers exist in writing somewhere.
Will finding out who’s who help Sullivan County? How can business owners and residents make the most of it? How can we benefit in a big way? Let’s get into the weeds of that in the next post.
– Site Editor, 05-01-26
