Local questions, local tools: a county-sized alternative to Big AI

SussexCounty.ai starts from a simple complaint: checking one Sussex County parcel can mean working through a dozen county and state websites. The site is built only for Sussex County, and it puts public records in one place with plain-English explanations.

What you can use today

• A free permit lookup. Enter a Sussex County parcel ID, the PIN, and the site lists public building permits for that parcel. Use the county's PIN format, with the dashes and the decimal. Try it here.
• A land-use docket. As of Oct. 24, the site lists 610 land-use cases compiled from the county's public docket. Each case has its own page with the application type, area, application date and status as recorded. Browse the docket.
• Town pages. There's a page for each of the county's 25 incorporated municipalities, plus Long Neck. See the towns.
• A plain-language glossary of land, permit and property terms, each with a link to an official source. Read the glossary.

The site says each dataset carries an as-of date, and that individual owners, people and street addresses are never published in its statistics. A paid Pro tier adds parcel detail such as zoning, flood zone and lidar ground data.

SussexCounty.ai is not the county government. Official records stay with the county at sussexcountyde.gov, and where the two differ, official records control.

Why scale matters

The loudest AI news is about the biggest machines, so the numbers are worth knowing. The U.S. Department of Energy reported in December 2024 that data centers used about 4.4% of U.S. electricity in 2023 and could reach 6.7% to 12% by 2028, citing a Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory study. The Congressional Research Service, citing an International Energy Agency study, says a 100-megawatt data center may use roughly 530,000 gallons of water a day, averaged across cooling methods (CRS R48646).

Delaware is already part of this story. In January, Spotlight Delaware reported that Delmarva Power told regulators it was talking with five data center developers whose projects would need a combined 2 gigawatts. Statewide peak load is 2.3 gigawatts in winter and 2.7 in summer, according to PJM. The state's Public Advocate said the effect on bills can't be known without complex analysis.

In February, WHYY reported that DNREC ruled the design for Project Washington, a proposed 1.2-gigawatt campus in Delaware City, isn't permitted under the Coastal Zone Act. Technical.ly reported in June that the four pending projects Delmarva described are in New Castle and Kent counties.

One more question needs no study. When a tool answers a question about your own property, where does that question go, and who keeps it? Ask that of any tool you use.

SussexCounty.ai argues that questions about one county can be answered by tools built for one county.

Try it

Look up a permit by PIN, free, at sussexcounty.ai/permits. Then explore the docket and town pages at sussexcounty.ai.