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Debate kit Grade 12 Social Studies & Civics

Should Thurlow County Approve the Draycott Data Center?

A grade 12 debate kit on a fictional county's 20-year water service agreement with a data center, with two-sided evidence on jobs, aquifer decline, and rates.

Objectives

  1. Students will argue for or against a large industrial water contract using marginal cost and benefit reasoning.
  2. Students will convert a proposed industrial demand into an equivalent number of households to judge its scale.
  3. Students will rebut an opposing economic claim using named evidence rather than general assertions.

Vocabulary

Drawdown
Drawdown is how far the water level in a well drops when a pump pulls water out. The harder and longer you pump, the bigger the drawdown gets.

Also: service agreement, take-or-pay, marginal cost, economic development

Teacher overview

This kit runs as a two-team structured debate before a student board of county commissioners, with one preparation session and one debate session. The resolution asks whether a fictional county should sign a long-term water service agreement with a large computing campus, which is a live question in many places where data centers are siting near affordable land and power. The tension is genuine, because the same contract that brings capital, tax revenue, and jobs also commits a declining aquifer to one customer for twenty years, and neither side wins on the evidence alone.

Should Thurlow County Approve the Draycott Data Center? — Grade 12 Social Studies & Civics
Name: ____________________________ Date: ______________

Resolution & Background

Resolution: "Thurlow County should approve the Draycott Data Group's twenty-year water service agreement for its proposed computing campus at Cadmar Flats."

Background: Thurlow County is a fictional county created for this debate. Its water authority serves about 21,000 connections and delivers roughly 6.4 MGD, drawn mostly from wells in a regional aquifer and partly from a small surface allocation. Draycott Data Group, also fictional, has proposed a computing campus that would use evaporative cooling. In our scenario, the campus would take an average of 1.8 MGD during warm months under a twenty-year service agreement, with a minimum monthly payment owed whether or not the campus uses the water. That structure is known in utility contracting as take-or-pay.

The county board must vote yes or no on the agreement as drafted. It cannot rewrite the terms during the hearing, though either side may propose conditions in its closing.

Roles. Two teams of four to six students argue the resolution. The affirmative team represents the county economic development office and the utility's finance director. The negative team represents a ratepayer coalition and the county's groundwater management district. Three to five students serve as commissioners, prepare one question for each team, and vote on the record at the end. One student serves as clerk and keeps time. Each team gets a four-minute constructive, a three-minute cross-examination, and a two-minute closing.

Evidence File

Case for approving the agreement:

  1. In our scenario, Draycott would pay $9.4 million toward two new wells, a transmission main, and a booster station, and the county would own those assets. The utility's fictional capital plan has no funding for that work until at least 2034. (Illustrative figures written for this debate.)
  2. Utilities across the country face a documented capital shortage. EPA's needs assessment estimates $625 billion in drinking-water infrastructure investment is needed over twenty years, with distribution pipes accounting for about two-thirds of that need. A private partner paying for capacity reduces what ratepayers must borrow. (Source: EPA Drinking Water Infrastructure Needs Survey and Assessment.)
  3. The take-or-pay minimum spreads the utility's fixed costs across a much larger billed volume. In our scenario, the fictional finance director projects that the residential base charge could hold steady for six years instead of rising in year three.
  4. In our scenario, the campus would generate an estimated $3.1 million per year in property tax revenue split between the county and the school district, plus about 900 construction jobs over three years and 65 permanent positions. (Illustrative figures written for this debate.)
  5. The agreement includes a drought clause. In stages one and two, the campus must reduce its take by the same percentage the county asks of commercial customers, which the county's fictional attorney argues is stricter than what most existing industrial customers face.

Case against approving the agreement:

  1. The scale is large relative to the system. In our scenario the campus would take 1.8 MGD, and the average US household uses about 300 gallons per day, so the campus alone would use roughly what 6,000 households use. That is a substantial share of a system serving about 21,000 connections. (Household figure: EPA WaterSense.)
  2. The aquifer is already declining. In our scenario, county monitoring wells show static water levels falling about 1.6 feet per year over the past decade, and the two new wells draw from the same formation.
  3. Water per permanent job is a fair test of a development deal. In our scenario, 1.8 MGD supports 65 permanent positions, while the county's fictional planning office reports that approved but unbuilt subdivisions would need about 1.1 MGD and house several thousand residents.
  4. The commitment lasts twenty years, and the drought clause treats the campus lightly in the early stages. Under the draft, mandatory residential outdoor restrictions begin at stage one, while the campus faces only the commercial-customer percentage in stages one and two and no mandatory curtailment of its contract volume until stage three. The fictional ratepayer coalition argues that households therefore carry the heavier early cut.
  5. Take-or-pay cuts both ways. If the campus closes or moves work elsewhere, the county's fictional bond counsel warns that the debt on the new wells and main remains, and remaining ratepayers cover it.

From Water for Schools (waterforschools.org). This material is in the public domain (CC0) and may be copied, edited, and shared freely.

Rubric
Criterion Emerging Developing Proficient Advanced
Evidence use Asserts a position with no evidence from the file Cites one piece of evidence without explaining its relevance Cites at least two pieces of evidence and explains how each supports the team's position Cites multiple pieces of evidence, explains each clearly, and distinguishes the illustrative figures from the sourced national figures
Marginal reasoning Treats the decision as all benefit or all cost Names a cost and a benefit without comparing them Compares the added benefit of the contract against its added cost in water, risk, or obligation Compares added benefit and added cost and identifies the condition under which the answer would flip
Rebuttal quality Does not respond to the other team Responds in general terms without addressing a specific claim Rebuts a specific opposing claim using named evidence Rebuts several claims, ranks them by importance, and concedes a minor point to strengthen the main one
Organization and delivery Argument is hard to follow and runs past time Structure is present but transitions are unclear Follows a clear claim, evidence, and conclusion structure within the time limit Structured, responsive to commissioner questions, and delivered in the team's own words rather than read

Differentiation

Support

Give these students a one-page card carrying the two strongest points for their assigned side, with the arithmetic already worked, and provide rebuttal starters such as "Our opponents rely on the fictional planning office estimate, yet that figure assumes ___." Assign them the cross-examination role, where questions can be prepared in advance.

Extension

Ask advanced students to draft three conditions the commissioners could attach to an approval, such as a metered reporting requirement, a stricter drought stage for the campus, or a reserve fund tied to the take-or-pay minimum, and to argue which condition the company would most likely accept and why.

ELL supports

Pre-teach "service agreement," "drawdown," "take-or-pay," and "marginal cost" with a labeled sketch of a well field feeding both a town and a large customer. Permit the closing statement to be delivered from a written script, and allow rebuttal notes to be submitted in writing instead of spoken.

Extensions

After the vote, have the class research how their own state regulates large groundwater withdrawals. Students should identify whether a permit is required, which agency issues it, and whether the public may comment before it is granted, then compare that real process with the fictional county's board hearing.