The Maryland Department of the Environment (MDE) rescinded a settlement offer from Quantum Loophole on June 18, for $130,000. The Frederick News-Post reported that the settlement offer was made in November 2023, to resolve violations concerning water management, water resources, and water, ice, and sanitary facilities in the environmental section of Maryland law. The violations related to constructing fiber optic infrastructure occurred from August 2022 through October 2023.
Quantum Loophole is building a data center campus of 2,100 acres in Frederick County, MD. The campus will be connected to the “data center alley” in Virginia’s Loudoun County by a 40-mile-long fiber optic ring that will cross Frederick and Montgomery counties in Maryland.
Twenty-five inspections on the project between August 2022 and October 2023 indicated various violations, including:
- Unauthorized impacts to wetlands and waterways from bore mud
- Unauthorized discharges of bore mud to a Potomac River tributary
- Four separate unauthorized bore mud and drilling additive discharges due to hydraulic directional drilling
- Multiple amounts of drilling fluid being released to the ground surface, two of which MDE was not notified about. The Frederick News-Post reported that some of the violations had been corrected, and attempts had been made to clean up the bore mud discharges. However, the MDE still believes a “penalty is warranted to resolve the matter.” MDE can seek up to $25,000 per day for sediment pollution and up to $10,000 per day for water pollution and nontidal wetland violations.
MDE has turned the matter over to the Maryland Office of the Attorney General for formal enforcement. Quantum’s website states, “It has become apparent to us that more oversight was needed for the construction of QLoop. We are continuously assessing the project team to ensure we have the best contractors in place.”
Quantum Loophole also said, “It’s important to understand that due to the unique nature and location of certain segments of the QLoop Project, there may be instances where violations are unavoidable or that will remain open until environmental restoration is approved by MDE.”
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