Topic
The surge in electricity consumption from data centers, driven by AI and cloud computing growth, straining grids and reshaping power planning worldwide.
Pew Research Center finds 67% of the 1,500-plus US data centers in development are planned for rural areas, while 87% of about 3,000 running now are urban. Many developers are building their own power on site, so county boards now set the pace.
Reality
The Denver startup left stealth with $8 million and a factory-built supercritical CO2 block that sits at a simple-cycle turbine's exhaust. Its case to operators is that the turbine itself needs no permit work.
Reality
Global data center electricity use goes from about 415 TWh in 2024 to roughly 945 TWh in 2030 on the agency's April 2025 projection, and the transmission and generation to serve it take five to ten years against a data center's 18 to 24 months.
Reality
The turbines feeding SpaceXAI's Colossus 2 went in under a Mississippi rule that asks whether equipment is portable rather than what it emits, which is why the fight is over a legal category and not over anyone's measurements.
Reality
Shapiro pulled AI data centers from fast-track review and attached power, water and disclosure conditions. AEP Ohio already showed what happens when the ask has to be backed with money.
Reality
A Fast Company essay argues a $5, 15-minute model can find idle grid headroom. If it holds, the constraint on 200GW of US data center demand is siting intelligence, not steel.
Reality
Operators added 8.3GW in the first half of 2026 on a 43.6GW base. The build is driven by solar co-location economics, so industrial buyers need to model a different evening peak.
Reality