Utah city ordered to release NSA center water usage numbers

FILE: An aerial view of the NSA's Utah Data Center in Bluffdale, Utah. (AP)

SALT LAKE CITY – A state panel has ordered that information detailing how much water the NSA Utah Data Center uses be given to the Salt Lake Tribune.

The committee enforcing the state's open-records law on Wednesday voted 5-0 to order the city of Bluffdale to release the documents.

Bluffdale sells water to the National Security Agency's data center on the southern border of the city. It had earlier denied a records request from the newspaper after officials argued releasing the documents could threaten the site's security.

The Salt Lake Tribune reports the warehouse is thought to include troves of data collected under NSA surveillance.

Other government records indicate the massive center uses over 1 million gallons of water per day to cool its computer systems.