Nearly ten gigawatts of new load, and PJM wants to study it as a single project instead of a queue position. That filing out of Ohio is where we begin. One campus, its own study track, and one state's customers holding the transmission bill. I have questions. Welcome to The Data Center Daily. It's Wednesday, October 21st. After Ohio: Amazon puts development money behind twelve small reactors at a retired Indiana coal plant, a watchdog says Texas kept moving data center permits during a freeze, and Memphis splits six to six on a moratorium. Tap follow so the next episode finds you.
Dana Whitfield, writing for Data Center Feed:
The expansion under study is larger: according to the filing, it comprises approximately 9,570 MW of additional data center load and 10,170 MW of gross new generating capacity, with phased completion through 2032, supported by three proposed 765-kV transmission lines and related infrastructure.
PJM filed this at FERC on Tuesday, October 13th, in Docket ER27-126. It's an executed study agreement under the State Agreement Approach, which Ohio invoked in June. The parties are PJM, AEP Ohio Transmission and three SB Energy affiliates. The first 800 megawatt phase is already served under Ohio Power's data center tariff, and the filing names OpenAI as the tenant. Pike County came up here October 4th, with OpenAI's twenty-year, eight gigawatt Ohio lease. And the generation never enters the interconnection queue. Everyone else waits years in line. This one gets a lane of its own. PJM's phrasing is that the agreement "establishes a different study process, but not different substantive reliability standards." Load, generation and wires get studied together. The study itself grants nothing: no transmission rights, no project selection, no cost allocation. The developer covers PJM's study costs, starting with a 500,000 dollar deposit. Here's my problem. Under the State Agreement Approach, transmission a state sponsors gets recovered from that state's customers. SB Energy says it will pay for its infrastructure under the White House Ratepayer Protection Pledge, with payment obligations that apply regardless of actual usage. That's a promise. The allocation still belongs to PUCO and FERC. The numbers don't line up yet, either. DOE's March 20 announcement described 9.2 gigawatts of gas backed by 33.3 billion dollars in Japanese funding, while the filing says 10,170 megawatts of gross new generation. And PJM wants the agreement effective September 25th, the day it was signed. Whether FERC accepts that, for a template this size, is the next thing to watch.
Sonal C. Patel, writing in POWER:
AEP and X-energy announced the joint development agreement (JDA) on Oct. 19, identifying the retired Breed Generating Station in Sullivan County, Indiana, as a potential location for 12 of X-energy’s 80-MW Xe-100 reactors.
That was Monday. Three blocks of four reactors, 320 megawatts each, 960 in total. Amazon provides development funding, milestone-based according to X-energy, and intends to buy the output under a long-term contract that AEP says would cover the plant's costs and operations for its duration. "Agreed to evaluate." POWER lists what's missing: no capital cost, no figure for Amazon's funding, no contract term or price, no ownership structure. No FID date, no construction schedule, no commercial operation target, no NRC licensing path. It does fit a pattern. This is AEP's third customer-linked generation announcement in about a week: the roughly four billion dollar Google fuel cell plant in Wyoming we covered Monday, and Mainspring's deal to supply AEP up to 1.6 gigawatts of linear generators through 2034. Bill Fehrman says the agreements provide "all necessary capital protections and financial safeguards." I'll give them the cooling. Amazon says Xe-100 plants can run air-cooled condensers, water-cooled or hybrid, depending on local water. But this is project two of a collaboration targeting more than five gigawatts by 2039. The first, Cascade in Washington, envisions the same 960 megawatts. Feasibility stage is feasibility stage.
Emily Foxhall, reporting for The Texas Tribune:
The letter followed instructions from the governor last month for TCEQ to stop issuing “all permits related to data center projects” while other state agencies and the state electric grid operator gathered and checked information about data centers’ proposed water and power use.
Abbott's directive came Monday, September 21st. Then this Monday, Public Citizen named more than a dozen data center plans it says kept moving through TCEQ, including at least six stormwater construction permits approved after the order. Those are the permits you need to clear and grade a site. Both sides are on record. TCEQ's interim executive director told the governor in a letter Monday that the agency has paused permits directly supporting data centers. Abbott spokesman Andrew Mahaleris says no permits have been approved. And on Tuesday, a TCEQ spokesman said those stormwater permits had been suspended. Suspended the day after the press conference. Why developers should care: Abbott's August order stopped ERCOT grid connections from moving forward, but projects building their own power could sidestep it. TCEQ permits air emissions from gas plants and diesel generators, so this pause reaches the behind-the-meter builds. IIR reports ERCOT aims for an initial audit filing around December 10th, which suggests months, not years. Meanwhile in Hill County, a resident says trucks are running up and down the road at the Nexus Data Centers site. Linda Polley's question for the governor: "What exactly did you pause?"
Steven Frank, writing for Newsweek:
Memphis leaders rejected an 18-month moratorium on new data center development Tuesday, deadlocking 6-6 on a proposal born from growing concerns over the rapid expansion of the power-hungry artificial intelligence industry.
We previewed this vote on October 5th. The next day the council postponed it seven to five, at a meeting where police cleared the chamber, and the proposed pause grew from twelve months to eighteen. Councilwoman Yolanda Cooper-Sutton was absent for Tuesday's tally. Sponsor JB Smiley says the message was never no to data centers forever, just slow it down. Jerri Green says the council failed the citizens of Memphis. And existing facilities would have kept running regardless. This was about the next expansion. The fight moves to two other venues. Mayor Paul Young's 90-day review of rules for large and hyperscale data centers is still underway. And on Monday, per a release from the Southern Environmental Law Center, a federal court in Mississippi denied the Justice Department's bid to dismiss the NAACP's Clean Air Act suit over xAI's gas turbines powering Colossus 2. The court lets DOJ intervene, but the citizen suit stands. The council couldn't slow it down. A judge still might.
Building in Texas right now, or sitting in a PJM queue while Ohio gets its own track? Tell us what you're seeing on the ground: datacenterdaily at lantern podcasts dot com.
Three things to track from today: FERC's response to the Ohio study agreement, any FID date for the Indiana reactors, and ERCOT's December audit filing. The Data Center Daily is back tomorrow. This has been a Lantern Podcast, and we appreciate you spending the time.