The 30 US counties absorbing the AI buildout
Across 144 publicly known AI and hyperscaler campuses
in 114 counties across 36 states,
operators have announced 90.9 gigawatts of new electricity load.
61% of that load is concentrated in just the
top 10 counties below — each one a place where one or two campuses could
double or triple the local grid's peak demand.
Top 30 counties by announced megawatts
1
Lead operator
Fermi America (Rick Perry)
Property tax Δ (3y)
-2.7%
Operators: Fermi America (Rick Perry) · 1 campus
- Project Matador Fermi America (Rick Perry) · 11.0 GW
2
Lead operator
SB Energy (SoftBank)
Property tax Δ (3y)
+14.4%
Operators: SB Energy (SoftBank) · 1 campus
- SB Energy Portsmouth SB Energy (SoftBank) · 10.0 GW
3
Lead operator
O'Leary Digital (MIDA)
Utility
Rocky Mountain Power
Property tax Δ (3y)
+19.7%
Operators: O'Leary Digital (MIDA) · 1 campus
- Stratos Project O'Leary Digital (MIDA) · 9.0 GW
4
Utility
Dominion Energy Virginia
Property tax Δ (3y)
+7.2%
Operators: AWS, QTS · 2 campuses
- PW Digital Gateway (QTS) QTS/Blackstone · 7.0 GW
- Manassas AWS
5
Lead operator
Sailfish Digital Ventures
Utility
United Cooperative Services
Property tax Δ (3y)
+6.7%
Operators: Sailfish Digital Ventures · 1 campus
- Comanche Circle Sailfish Digital Ventures · 5.0 GW
6
Property tax Δ (3y)
+4.1%
Operators: Microsoft · 2 campuses
- Fairwater Wisconsin Microsoft · 3.3 GW
- Mount Pleasant Microsoft
7
Lead operator
Carlyle Group
Property tax Δ (3y)
+12.0%
Operators: Carlyle Group · 1 campus
- Fort Bliss Carlyle Campus Carlyle Group · 3.0 GW
8
Utility
Black Hills Energy
Property tax Δ (3y)
+15.4%
Operators: Crusoe, Meta, Microsoft · 3 campuses
- Crusoe Wyoming Crusoe/Tallgrass · 1.8 GW
- Cheyenne (Meta) Meta · 800 MW
- Cheyenne Campus Microsoft
9
Utility
Indiana Michigan Power
Property tax Δ (3y)
+14.6%
Operators: AWS, Microsoft · 2 campuses
- Project Rainier AWS/Anthropic · 2.2 GW
- Granger Microsoft
10
Property tax Δ (3y)
+9.4%
Operators: Crusoe, OpenAI · 2 campuses
- Stargate Abilene OpenAI/Microsoft/Oracle/Crusoe · 1.2 GW
- Crusoe Abilene Phase 2 Crusoe/Microsoft · 900 MW
11
Property tax Δ (3y)
+6.9%
Operators: xAI · 2 campuses
- Colossus 2 xAI · 2.0 GW
- Colossus xAI
12
Utility
Entergy Louisiana
Property tax Δ (3y)
+10.3%
Operators: Meta · 1 campus
13
Utility
Appalachian Power
Property tax Δ (3y)
+2.0%
Operators: Nscale · 1 campus
- Monarch Nscale/Microsoft · 2.0 GW
14
Property tax Δ (3y)
+4.8%
Operators: IREN · 1 campus
15
Lead operator
Stack Infrastructure
Utility
Appalachian Power
Property tax Δ (3y)
+10.6%
Operators: Stack Infrastructure · 1 campus
- Berry Hill Megasite Stack Infrastructure · 2.0 GW
16
Utility
Entergy Mississippi
Property tax Δ (3y)
+6.9%
Operators: xAI · 1 campus
- xAI Southaven Expansion xAI · 2.0 GW
17
Lead operator
CyrusOne (KKR
Utility
Rocky Mountain Power
Property tax Δ (3y)
+20.2%
Operators: CyrusOne (KKR · 1 campus
- Dugway CyrusOne Campus CyrusOne (KKR/BlackRock) · 2.0 GW
18
Lead operator
Arizona Land Consulting
Utility
Arizona Public Service
Property tax Δ (3y)
+6.6%
Operators: Apple, Arizona Land Consulting, Google + 2 · 6 campuses
- Hassayampa Ranch Arizona Land Consulting / Social Capital · 1.5 GW
- Mesa Meta
- Goodyear Campus Microsoft
- El Mirage Campus Microsoft
- Mesa (Google) Google
- Mesa (Apple) Apple
19
Property tax Δ (3y)
+7.2%
Operators: SoftBank · 1 campus
- Stargate Lordstown SoftBank/OpenAI/Oracle · 1.5 GW
20
Lead operator
Prometheus Hyperscale
Utility
Rocky Mountain Power
Property tax Δ (3y)
+7.8%
Operators: Prometheus Hyperscale · 1 campus
- Prometheus Hyperscale Natrona Prometheus Hyperscale/Spiritus · 1.5 GW
21
Property tax Δ (3y)
+9.6%
Operators: OpenAI · 1 campus
- Stargate Saline Township OpenAI/Oracle/Related Digital · 1.4 GW
22
Property tax Δ (3y)
+11.5%
Operators: Google, Nebius · 2 campuses
- Independence Nebius · 1.2 GW
- Kansas City Google
23
Property tax Δ (3y)
+10.1%
Operators: SoftBank · 1 campus
- Stargate Milam County SoftBank/SB Energy/OpenAI · 1.2 GW
24
Property tax Δ (3y)
+12.2%
Operators: AWS, Google, Meta + 1 · 4 campuses
- Prometheus Meta · 1.0 GW
- Heath/Hebron Campus Microsoft
- New Albany (Google) Google
- New Albany (AWS) AWS
25
Property tax Δ (3y)
+3.3%
Operators: Oracle · 1 campus
- Stargate Lighthouse Oracle/OpenAI/Vantage · 1.0 GW
26
Property tax Δ (3y)
+7.8%
Operators: Hut 8 · 1 campus
- Beacon Point Hut 8 / American Bitcoin · 1.0 GW
27
Lead operator
Bolt Data & Energy
Property tax Δ (3y)
+9.3%
Operators: Bolt Data & Energy · 1 campus
- Bolt West Texas Bolt Data & Energy / Texas Pacific Land · 1.0 GW
28
Property tax Δ (3y)
+5.0%
Operators: AWS · 1 campus
- Susquehanna Campus AWS · 960 MW
29
Lead operator
Atlas Development
Property tax Δ (3y)
+13.3%
Operators: Atlas Development · 1 campus
- Project Sail (Newnan) Atlas Development/Prologis · 900 MW
30
Lead operator
Energy Storage Solutions
Utility
Duke Energy Progress
Property tax Δ (3y)
+6.2%
Operators: Energy Storage Solutions · 1 campus
- Tarboro Edgecombe Campus Energy Storage Solutions · 900 MW
By state
| # | State | Announced load | Campuses |
|---|
| 1 | Texas | 28.8 GW | 26 |
| 2 | Ohio | 12.7 GW | 11 |
| 3 | Utah | 11.0 GW | 3 |
| 4 | Virginia | 9.1 GW | 12 |
| 5 | Wisconsin | 4.3 GW | 4 |
| 6 | Wyoming | 4.1 GW | 4 |
| 7 | Indiana | 2.7 GW | 5 |
| 8 | Tennessee | 2.0 GW | 3 |
| 9 | Mississippi | 2.0 GW | 3 |
| 10 | Louisiana | 2.0 GW | 1 |
| 11 | West Virginia | 2.0 GW | 1 |
| 12 | Arizona | 1.5 GW | 7 |
| 13 | Kansas | 1.5 GW | 2 |
| 14 | Michigan | 1.4 GW | 1 |
| 15 | Pennsylvania | 1.3 GW | 3 |
How this is computed
Campus list. Hand-curated from press releases, FOIA filings,
local zoning records and news coverage. Every site carries a source URL in
data/sites/data_centers.csv.
"Announced load" is the publicly disclosed megawatt figure where the
operator or utility has stated one; many campuses (especially older
hyperscaler builds) have never published a number and contribute zero to
the MW total even though they show up in the campus count.
County rollup. Each campus is mapped from its city/state
to a Census FIPS code via us_cities.csv + manual overrides for
townships and unincorporated sites. Counties are then ranked by the sum of
announced megawatts across all campuses they host.
Resi rate Δ. The percent change in the county's lead utility's
residential electricity price between 2024 and the mean of 2021–2023,
from EIA Form 861. Captures whether households in the county are already
paying more for power on a multi-year baseline.
Home price Δ. Percent change in the county's trailing-3-month
median sale price (volume-weighted by HOMES_SOLD) against the
mean of the prior three same-month windows at t−12 / t−24 / t−36 months.
From Redfin Data Center. Counties with < 30 sales in any of those four windows
are dropped to no-data.
Property tax Δ. Percent change in the county's median
real-estate tax (Census ACS B25103) between the latest 5-year endpoint and
the mean of the prior three. ACS 5-year windows overlap by 4 years —
treat magnitude as suggestive.
None of these Δs are caused by data centers alone. They are read-outs of
what the host community has been paying for electricity and housing in
the years the campus was being planned and built — the context that's
missing from most press-release coverage.