Developer eyes former BP campus in Naperville after previous rejection of data center proposal

Six months after the Naperville City Council pulled the plug on plans for a data center along Warrenville Road, the same developer is eyeing the nearby former BP campus, officials have confirmed.

Naperville Mayor Scott Wehrli and City Manager Doug Krieger met with developer Karis Critical and JLL, the company listing the BP property, at the Naperville Development Partnership last month, according to a memo.

The memo says one of the key points raised during the meeting is that Karis was considering a data center and advanced manufacturing facility at the sprawling former BP campus along Warrenville Road between Washington and Mill streets. The roughly 169-acre property is immediately north of I-88.

According to the May 29 memo, Karis also discussed the possibility of including a recreational use, such as a health club or adaptive dive pool, on the site.

City officials and a spokesman for Karis confirmed this week that the meeting took place.

“The Naperville Development Partnership facilitated a meeting to discuss the site’s history, current condition, and potential future uses,” Karis spokesman Patrick Skarr said in an email Wednesday.

Skarr said there is no pending proposal for the former BP site and that Karis “has made no decision about whether to pursue an investment in the city’s jobs corridor.”

He noted that Karis does not solely focus on data center development. The company also builds cold storage, industrial and advanced manufacturing facilities.

“This was never a data center only evaluation,” Skarr said of the May meeting. “There were a variety of concepts that we discussed.”

He said advanced manufacturing facilities can often include a data center component to support operations.

While Skarr confirmed that Karis has been in talks regarding the former BP site, he declined to say when the talks began and stressed the company has not yet made a decision about the property.

On Wednesday, Wehrli said he and Krieger told Karis representatives during the May meeting that a data center would not be well-received.

“They were taking our pulse on what might work and what might not work,” Wehrli said. “We provided them feedback that would suggest that a data center is not something we believe would be favorable in the city at this time.”

Krieger said the campus is the city’s largest redevelopment opportunity. He said Karis representatives indicated during the meeting that the company would pay for a cleanup of the site, which could be extensive.

The property, which has remained vacant for about eight years, has struggled to attract interest from developers, Krieger said.

Prior to Karis, two other developers have inquired about the property within the last year. No one has submitted plans for review.

“The pool of potential users is pretty small,” Krieger said. “People aren’t banging down the door to get that property.”

According to a source from the meeting, the site could support 1.5 million square feet of advanced manufacturing, potentially bringing 1,000 to 1,500 new jobs to the city.

While Karis has not submitted any plans for the city to review, company officials brought conceptual drawings to the May meeting with the Naperville Development Partnership, Krieger said.

The Naperville Development Partnership is a nonprofit group. The public-private partnership focuses on economic development within the city.

In a 2025 report, a consultant for the partnership identifies five types of industries that would be suitable for the I-88 corridor. The uses included financial tech, energy, biotech or pharmaceutical, agricultural or food production, and quantum or advanced manufacturing. The report also suggests the city should create a special zoning district for the I-88 corridor focused on those key industries.

“We want to position the corridor for innovation and growth,” said Monica Conners, president of the Naperville Development Partnership.

Conners says she attended the meeting with Karis. While she regularly receives calls from data center developers, she stressed the partnership is not seeking out data center projects.

“The Naperville Development Partnership is not actively working to attract data centers,” Conners said.