Amazon Is Quietly Building the Biggest Gas Power Plant in the US
Amazon Is Creating the Biggest Pollution Source in the Country
Amazon has acquired land and permits in Pecos County, Texas, for a 7.65-gigawatt gas power plant to power an AI data center, separate from the state's grid. The plant would emit 33 million tons of CO2 annually, making it the largest pollution source in the country, contradicting Amazon's net-zero pledge. Construction permits have been filed, and land clearing has begun, but the project faces likely public opposition due to environmental and local concerns.
The plant will be completely separate from Texas’s power grid, at least in the beginning, the permits show.
- rgmerk
Some thoughts:
* you can run data centres on grid electricity, which can come from mostly-renewable sources (in short, you need gas mainly as as an occasional backup).
* running things off-grid is dumb, and they’re only doing it because they’re desperate to get their data centres up and running yesterday so that they’re the ones who get to the singularity first (or some approximation thereof).
* the US electricity grid is f**d, mostly for the same reasons you can’t build any linear infrastructure in the United States - too many bodies hold veto powers and use any such infrastructure as an extortion opportunity.
* The spike in gas-powered generation for data centres is essentially a US phenomenon. Globally, the vast majority of new electricity supply is coming from renewables.
* in a sane world, Amazon and new large-scale data centre providers would face punitive carbon charges to incentivise them to switch to mostly renewables as soon as possible.
- zepearl
Let's add as well "SpaceX’s Terafab will rely on natural gas power plants, not Tesla solar panels" to the mix :o(
https://techcrunch.com/2026/08/07/spacexs-terafab-will-rely-...
- fhdkweig
Dupe of https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49220350
256 comments, 8 hours ago
- MarkWayneNewton
At least these sites (its more than Amazon) are being built near the energy source they will consume. Straight out of the ground into a turbine and then into the electron spinners.
Also there's not a lot of anything where these sites are located (Near El Paso). The 4-5 Road Runners who live around there will probably appreciate the change.
West Texas is basically Mad Max 2.
- paulkrush
Permitted maximum of 10 grams(2 nickels) of CO2 per hour for every person in the US. 33 million tons * 2000 ton/pound * 454 g/pound / 365 days in a year / 24 hours in a day / 342.6M people in us = 9.984 grams
- synack
Don't these things get more efficient as they scale up? One big plant is probably better than 30 small ones.
- raincole
It sounds... pretty good? It's not going to put pressure to the existing grid. Nor it will use freshwater. Near to the data centers themselves so the waste from power transmission is minimalized.
- coralreef
Carbon tax would shift the economics in favor of renewables.