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Gridcensus

Lake Gas Recovery

Brownfield

Northbrook, Cook, Illinois · WM Illinois Renewable Energy LLC

Legacy capacity
3
MW

Lake Gas Recovery is a natural gas plant in Northbrook, Cook, Illinois, retired 2008-10-01. Retired generation sites are among the most attractive datacenter redevelopment targets: the existing interconnection was sized for roughly 3 MW of generation, so the grid hookup, transmission rights, and often cooling-water access are already in place — collapsing the speed-to-power timeline versus a greenfield build.

Former use & capacity

Former usenatural gas plant
Site typeretired_plant
Existing capacity3 MW
Retirement date2008-10-01
EIA plant ID#50575

Grid hookup & remediation

Nearest substation2.0 mi
Operator address1300 Willow Road, Northbrook, IL, 60062
Why this site is datacenter-attractive: a natural gas plant of this scale leaves behind a high-capacity grid interconnection that a new load can re-use, frequently shaving years off the interconnection queue. Retired-plant sites also tend to be already zoned for heavy industrial use with established road, rail, and water infrastructure.

Site conditions & market — Cook County

County-level intelligence for this site's location — the power economics, water, hazard, connectivity, and workforce a developer screens before ever visiting. Assembled from FEMA NRI, BLS QCEW, FCC BDC, USGS water-use, and EIA.

Market & workforce

Total employment (laborshed)2,269,519
IT / tech employment9,031
Construction employment76,056
Land value$18,054/acre
Datacenter tax incentivesales_tax_exemption

Power economics & interconnection

Commercial power rate8.86¢/kWh
Industrial power rate5.29¢/kWh
Load growth (FERC-714)0.7%

Water & cooling

Water stressLow
Public water supply834.1 MGD
Industrial water use65.2 MGD
Cooling degree days1,100
Mean annual temp52°F

Hazard, flood & connectivity

FEMA risk index35.0 · Relatively High
Fiber providers18 · 36% served

County-level context — address-level utility offerings and flood zoning vary within the county. Confirm site-specific service with the utility and a Phase I ESA.

Nearby brownfield & retired-generation sites

A proximity screen of other retired-plant, contaminated, and EPA-flagged sites near Lake Gas Recovery — the environmental neighborhood, ranked by legacy grid capacity.

SiteFormer useLegacy MWDistanceCleanup status
Crawfordcoal plant80519.8 mi—
Waukegancoal plant80319.1 mi—
Southeast Chicago Energy Projectnatural gas plant40730.2 mi—
Zion Energy Centernatural gas plant39826.0 mi—
Fisk Streetcoal plant37419.5 mi—
Electric Junctionnatural gas plant30423.4 mi—
Calumetnatural gas plant27830.5 mi—
Bloomoil plant1524.4 mi—

Derived from GridCensus's retired-generator & EPA brownfield dataset. Not a substitute for an ASTM E1527 Phase I environmental radius report.

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Nearby datacenter candidate sites

Scored candidate sites near Lake Gas Recovery, ranked by DC Readiness.

Candidate sites near Lake Gas Recovery
SiteTypeStateCountyVoltageCapacityQueue waitScore
UNKNOWN122269Substation-AdjacentILCook County345 kV600 MW3.8 yrs71.4
UNKNOWN121936Substation-AdjacentILKenosha County345 kV600 MW3.8 yrs70.6
UNKNOWN124436Substation-AdjacentILCook County345 kV600 MW3.8 yrs70.4
UNKNOWN133790Substation-AdjacentILLake County345 kV600 MW3.8 yrs68.9
UNKNOWN122285Substation-AdjacentILCook County345 kV600 MW3.8 yrs68.7
UNKNOWN124699Substation-AdjacentILCook County345 kV600 MW3.8 yrs67.1
ELMHURSTSubstation-AdjacentILDuPage County345 kV600 MW3.8 yrs67.1
ITASCASubstation-AdjacentILDuPage County345 kV600 MW3.8 yrs67.0

Nearby internet exchanges

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Dataset updated . Screening estimates derived from public data sources.

Brownfield attributes are derived from EIA retired-generator and EPA public data. Existing capacity reflects the retired plant's historical nameplate, not deliverable interconnection for a new load. Confirm reusable interconnection rights, remediation status, and site availability with the utility, ISO, and current owner.

Go deeper than the public screen

This page shows a public slice of the GridCensus dataset for Lake Gas Recovery, Northbrook, Cook, Illinois. Pro and Enterprise plans unlock the full 147,272-site catalog, raw sub-scores, parcel ownership, interconnection-queue detail, saved searches, and programmatic API access.