LOUDOUN COUNTY, Va. (DC NEWS NOW) — Northern Virginia continues to grow as a tech hub.

“We have become the largest concentrate of data centers anywhere in the world. In fact, if you took the next six markets, put them all together, it wouldn’t equal what we’ve established here in Loudoun County,” said Buddy Rizer, Executive Director of Loudoun County’s Department of Economic Development.

There are more than “31 million square feet” of data centers in roughly 160 buildings.

The data centers account for roughly $700 million of the local tax revenue in Loudoun County, per year.

Although Loudoun County is growing in the data world, many people still don’t understand how data centers work.

“Data centers are as critical to day-to-day life anymore as power plants or water treatment plants or all those kinds of things. Because, you know, data centers are the infrastructure behind your cell phone, behind the Internet,” Rizer said. “There hasn’t been a day without data center construction in Loudoun County for 16 years now. So, we’ve continued to build and build. There are about 3 million square feet of data centers that are being built right now.”

In January, Gov. Glenn Youngkin announced that Amazon Web Services plans to invest $35 billion in new data centers in Virginia.