Vineland Residents Say AI Data Center Hum Is Ruining Their Sleep

Scott Montgomery's son thought it was helicopters at first.

The low, steady drone that rises from the DataOne/Nebius campus under construction on South Lincoln Avenue arrived gradually, then seemed to grow. Montgomery, who lives about half a mile from the site near the Hance Bridge Road and Pennsylvania Avenue corridor, says what began as background noise has become inescapable after dark. "You hear that continuing noise for hours on end, and it disrupts your sleep," he told reporters. "You can't fall asleep right away. It wakes you up. We like to sleep with windows open because it got nice out. It was a brutal winter. And you could just feel it pulsating through the house."

His videos of the hum, posted to Instagram from his back porch surrounded by three acres of farm fields, turned Montgomery into something neither he nor his neighbors anticipated: a viral voice for a widening community revolt.

Philadelphia Inquirer columnist Will Bunch framed the situation in a column published April 2 as a preview of what happens when hyperscale AI infrastructure lands in a community that was never formally asked. The DataOne facility, developed in partnership with the Netherlands-based Nebius Group to support a $17 billion cloud computing deal with Microsoft, is a 300-megawatt campus spanning roughly 2.6 million square feet across six buildings at the corner of South Lincoln and Sheridan avenues, just off Exit 26 of Route 55. Phase one is already partially operational. Full completion is projected by the end of 2026.

The accountability gap at the heart of this story is structural. Because the property sits inside Vineland's Urban Enterprise Zone, neighbors were not legally required to receive notification before the project was permitted. Research scientist Zac Landicini, a lifelong Vineland resident, put it plainly: "I think I was just taken aback with how sudden that change happened. And with how little notice anybody was really given."

DataOne insists the noise is a temporary byproduct of active construction and points to inspections as proof of compliance. "Based on recent inspections and acoustical monitoring conducted by the Cumberland County Health Department, our site is operating in full compliance with Vineland City noise ordinance limits," the company said in a statement. "We will continue deploying sound reduction measures to minimize any impact on our neighbors." The Cumberland County Health Department confirmed it has made multiple site visits to measure sound levels in the residential corridor between Lincoln Avenue and Hance Bridge Road, but as of publication had not publicly confirmed the precise source of the noise.

That ambiguity is exactly what Bunch and local environmental advocates say makes enforcement difficult. Noise ordinances are typically measured at property lines using decibel thresholds, a standard that was not designed with continuous, low-frequency industrial humming in mind. And if the facility's on-site power strategy, which includes a proposed 1.5-million-gallon LNG storage tank currently awaiting state DEP review, is generating the hum rather than construction equipment, the "temporary construction" explanation collapses.

Residents who want to strengthen the public record can start by documenting the noise themselves. Time-stamped recordings on a smartphone, paired with written logs that note the date, time, duration, and weather conditions, create the kind of pattern evidence that regulators need to move beyond individual complaints. File formal complaints with the Cumberland County Health Department, which has jurisdiction over community noise and environmental health concerns, and with Vineland's Office of Code Enforcement. The New Jersey DEP's environmental complaint hotline at 1-877-WARN-DEP (1-877-927-6337) accepts noise and air-quality reports and is the appropriate channel to flag concerns about the pending LNG storage permit. State Assemblymembers and Cumberland County freeholders can also apply pressure on the DEP review timeline.

What happens to Montgomery and his neighbors near Hance Bridge Road over the next several months will likely determine whether Vineland develops enforceable standards for industrial noise before the remaining five buildings come fully online, or whether residents are left negotiating with a company that, by its own telling, is already in compliance with every rule that currently exists.