Stage 1 of 9
Power generation and fuel power
Every GPU-hour is a kilowatt-hour first. New firm capacity in the United States is gated by gas turbine order books, fuel delivery and permitting, not by demand.
- Unit
- MW
- Sells
- firm electricity and the fuel behind it (gas turbines and gas supply; nuclear restarts and uprates; solar with batteries; on-site generation)
- Lead time
- 3 years
- Status
- skeleton
Primer
What this stage is
Every GPU-hour is a kilowatt-hour first. A data centre needs firm power: electricity available every hour of the year, not the average output of a wind farm. In the United States that means gas-fired plants, nuclear, and increasingly solar paired with batteries, plus generators on the site itself while a grid connection is awaited.
How it works
A generator is bought by the megawatt of capacity and paid for by the megawatt-hour it produces. Two numbers describe it: the cost to build, in dollars per kilowatt, and the cost to run, in dollars per megawatt-hour, which is mostly fuel. A combined-cycle gas plant is the workhorse of firm supply; a simple-cycle turbine is cheaper to build and dearer to run, so it serves peaks. Nuclear has the highest build cost and the lowest fuel cost, which is why retired reactors are being restarted and existing ones uprated under long contracts with data-centre buyers.
The constraint is not demand. It is the order book for large gas turbines, which three manufacturers control, the delivery of fuel to the site, and the years of permitting and construction. A plant ordered today is a plant that runs several years from now.
What to watch
- Planned capacity additions by fuel and year, and how much of it is firm.
- Turbine order books and quoted delivery dates.
- Power purchase agreements signed by data-centre operators: price, term, source.
- Wholesale power prices in the regions where campuses cluster.
- On-site generation announcements: they signal a grid connection that could not be had in time.
How it connects
Megawatts of generation become megawatts delivered only through the grid stage. Downstream, the price of a megawatt-hour is the largest cash cost of a GPU-hour after the GPU itself.
Figures
| Metric | Value | Unit | As of | Scope | Confidence | Source | Note |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| us_utility_scale_generating_capacity | 1,280.8 | GW | 2025-12 | US | high | EIA, Electricity explained: Electricity generation, capacity, and sales in the United States | As printed: 1.2808e+06 MW. Total US utility-scale (1 MW and larger) generating capacity at end-2025; the same page gives 2025 net generation of about 4,429 billion kWh, so the fleet ran at about a 39% average capacity factor (4,429,000 GWh / (1,280.8 GW x 8,760 h), my arithmetic). |
| planned_capacity_additions_2026 | 86 | GW | 2026-02 | US | high | EIA, Today in Energy: New U.S. electric generating capacity expected to reach a record high in 2026 (February 20, 2026) | Developer-reported planned utility-scale additions for calendar 2026 from the EIA-860M inventory; the split is solar 43.4 GW, battery storage 24 GW, wind 11.8 GW and natural gas 6.3 GW, and 53 GW was actually added in 2025. |
| planned_natural_gas_additions_2026 | 6.3 | GW | 2026-02 | US | high | EIA, Today in Energy: New U.S. electric generating capacity expected to reach a record high in 2026 (February 20, 2026) | Planned 2026 gas-fired additions, the only large firm-generation category: 3.3 GW combined-cycle and 2.8 GW combustion turbine, against 43.4 GW of solar and 24 GW of batteries planned the same year. |
| ge_vernova_gas_equipment_backlog_and_slot_reservations | 116 | GW | 2026-06-30 | GE Vernova | high | GE Vernova, Form 8-K, second-quarter 2026 results press release (July 22, 2026) | Gas turbine equipment backlog (53 GW) plus slot reservation agreements (63 GW) at end of Q2 2026; the company expects at least 125 GW under contract by end-2026, and in the quarter it signed 20 GW of new gas contracts and shipped 3 GW. |
| ge_vernova_annual_gas_turbine_output | 20 | GW per year | 2026-07 | GE Vernova | high | GE Vernova, Form 8-K, second-quarter 2026 results press release (July 22, 2026) | Manufacturing run-rate: 20 GW/yr reached in Q3 2026, 24 GW planned for 2028 and 30 GW targeted for 2030; against 116 GW of backlog plus reservations this is about 5.8 years of current output (116 / 20, my arithmetic), which is why new orders are scheduled for 2029-2030 delivery. |
| ccgt_capital_cost_recent_projects | 2,000 | $/kW | 2025-09 | US | medium | GridLab and Energy Futures Group, The New Reality of Power Generation: An Analysis of Increasing Gas Turbine Costs in the U.S. (September 2025) | All-in capital cost reported in utility filings for recently announced combined-cycle gas plants; plants completing in 2026-27 were reported at $1,116-$1,427/kW, and the same report notes EIA's Sargent & Lundy reference assumption of $921/kW (2023 dollars) for a 1x1 H-class plant, so market prices roughly doubled the planning assumption. |
| pjm_capacity_price_2027_2028 | 333.44 | $/MW-day (UCAP) | 2025-12-17 | US | high | PJM Inside Lines, PJM Auction Procures 134,479 MW of Generation Resources (December 17, 2025) | RTO-wide clearing price of PJM's 2027/2028 Base Residual Auction, which cleared at the FERC-approved price cap; 134,479 MW of unforced capacity cleared and the total cost is $16.4 billion. |
| pjm_capacity_shortfall_2027_2028 | 6,623 | MW | 2025-12-17 | US | high | PJM Inside Lines, PJM Auction Procures 134,479 MW of Generation Resources (December 17, 2025) | Amount by which procured capacity plus Fixed Resource Requirement resources fell short of PJM's reliability requirement for the 2027/2028 delivery year; PJM attributes nearly 5,100 MW of the increase in the requirement to data-centre demand. |
| pjm_west_hub_wholesale_price_2025 | 60.09 | $/MWh | 2025 | US | high | EIA, Short-Term Energy Outlook, September 2026, table of wholesale electricity prices (dollars per megawatthour) | Annual average 2025 wholesale price at the PJM Western hub; the quoted table row lists 2025 Q1-Q4, 2026 Q1-Q4, 2027 Q1-Q4 and then annual 2025, 2026, 2027, so the 2025 actual is 60.09 and EIA's 2026 forecast is 80.59; the same table gives ERCOT North at 37.33 for 2025. This PDF is replaced each month and the September 2026 issue should later be found at eia.gov/outlooks/steo/archives/sep26.pdf. |
| data_center_share_of_us_electricity_2023 | 4.4 | percent of US electricity consumption | 2023 | US | high | Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, 2024 United States Data Center Energy Usage Report (December 2024) | 176 TWh of data-centre electricity use in 2023; the report's 2028 scenario range is 325-580 TWh (6.7%-12.0% of US consumption), which it converts to 74-132 GW of power demand assuming 50% average utilisation; this is the standard public baseline everyone quotes. |
| crane_clean_energy_center_restart_capacity | 835 | MW | 2026 | Constellation Energy (Crane Clean Energy Center) | high | Constellation Energy, Crane Clean Energy Center location page | Restart of the former Three Mile Island Unit 1, retired for economic reasons in 2019, expected online in 2027; the other announced US restarts are Palisades (more than 800 MW, Holtec, reached operations status August 2025) and Duane Arnold (615 MW, NextEra with Google, by Q1 2029), so all three together add roughly 2.25 GW (835 + 800 + 615, my arithmetic). |
| utility_scale_pv_installed_cost_2024 | 1.61 | $/W-AC | 2024 | US | high | Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, U.S. Utility-Scale Solar 2025 Data Update (slides, October 2025) | Capacity-weighted installed cost of utility-scale PV that came online in 2024, i.e. $1,610 per kW-AC (1.61 x 1,000); the same deck puts PV+battery hybrids at $2.5/W-AC-PV with the battery adding about $1.0/W-AC-PV and all-in battery capex at $458/kWh. |
| eia860m_planned_additions_2026_gw | 45.5 | GW nameplate, generators planned to enter service in 2026 (all fuels) | 2026-08 | US | high | EIA-860M, August 2026 (computed from the workbook by scripts/pull_eia860m.py; data/processed/eia860m/summaries) | Sum of planned generators with a 2026 planned operation year in the August 2026 inventory; of which gas (combined cycle, combustion turbine, engines, steam) 3.3 GW. Preliminary; planned dates slip. |
| eia860m_planned_additions_2027_gw | 91.7 | GW nameplate, generators planned to enter service in 2027 (all fuels) | 2026-08 | US | high | EIA-860M, August 2026 (computed from the workbook by scripts/pull_eia860m.py; data/processed/eia860m/summaries) | Of which gas 12.3 GW; 38.5 GW of the 2027 total was under construction or complete-not-operating (status V, U, TS) in August 2026. Preliminary; planned dates slip. |
| eia860m_operating_gas_capacity_gw | 581 | GW nameplate, operating natural-gas generators (all prime movers) | 2026-08 | US | high | EIA-860M, August 2026 (computed from the workbook by scripts/pull_eia860m.py; data/processed/eia860m/summaries) | Combined cycle, combustion turbine, internal combustion and steam units in the operating sheet; net summer capacity is lower. The firm fleet that data-centre load leans on until new turbines arrive. |
US supply
EIA-860M · 2026-08 · preliminary
| Year | Gas | Solar | Batteries | Wind | Nuclear | Other | Total | Under construction (GW) | Under construction (share of total, %) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 | 3.3 | 26.6 | 12.1 | 3.4 | 0.0 | 0.1 | 45.5 | 45.4 | 99.8 |
| 2027 | 12.3 | 43.4 | 25.1 | 10.0 | 0.0 | 1.0 | 91.7 | 38.5 | 42.0 |
| 2028 | 17.1 | 30.1 | 14.8 | 3.7 | 0.0 | 2.3 | 67.9 | 6.8 | 10.0 |
| 2029 | 14.5 | 16.2 | 9.0 | 2.1 | 0.0 | 0.2 | 42.1 | 2.8 | 6.6 |
| 2030 | 18.1 | 4.7 | 2.2 | 0.2 | 0.5 | 0.1 | 25.8 | 0.9 | 3.6 |
| Technology group | Nameplate | Net summer | Share of nameplate (%) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gas | 581.4 | 516.6 | 41.2 |
| Coal | 181.6 | 167.8 | 12.9 |
| Solar | 169.0 | 168.0 | 12.0 |
| Wind | 166.7 | 166.0 | 11.8 |
| Nuclear | 103.7 | 98.4 | 7.3 |
| Hydro | 102.3 | 103.1 | 7.2 |
| Batteries | 54.5 | 54.1 | 3.9 |
| Other | 52.3 | 44.7 | 3.7 |
Conversions
| From → To | Factor | Unit | As of | Confidence | Source | Note |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Power generation and fuel → Grid, interconnection and transformers | 0.74 | accredited MW per nameplate MW (PJM ELCC, gas combined cycle, 2027/28) | 2027/2028 delivery year | high | PJM, ELCC Class Ratings for the 2027/2028 Base Residual Auction | The quoted row is the table's values in reading order for these classes: Onshore Wind 41%, Offshore Wind 67%, Fixed-Tilt Solar 7%, Tracking Solar 8%, Landfill 48%, Hydro Intermittent 39%, 4-hr Storage 58%, 6-hr 67%, 8-hr 70%, 10-hr 78%, Demand Resource 92%, Nuclear 95%, Coal 83%, Gas Combined Cycle 74%, Gas Combustion Turbine 61%, Gas CT Dual Fuel 77%, Diesel 92%, Steam 72%, Waste to Energy 83%, Oil-Fired CT 80%; a 1,000 MW combined-cycle plant therefore counts 740 MW toward PJM's reliability requirement and a nuclear unit 950 MW. |
| Power generation and fuel → Power generation and fuel | 7,000 | Btu of natural gas per kWh generated (heat rate, new combined-cycle, upper bound) | 2024-02 | high | EIA, Today in Energy: Use of natural gas-fired generation differs in the United States by technology and region (February 22, 2024) | 7,000 Btu/kWh equals 7.0 MMBtu per MWh (7,000 x 1,000 / 1,000,000); a 1 GW combined-cycle plant at full output burns 7,000 MMBtu per hour or 168,000 MMBtu per day, about 0.16 Bcf/d at 1,037 Btu per cubic foot (168,000,000,000 / 1,037 = 162 million cf), so 10 GW of new gas plants for data centres is roughly 1.6 Bcf/d of gas demand; simple-cycle turbines run above 10,000 Btu/kWh. |
| Grid, interconnection and transformers → Power generation and fuel | 1.5 | GW of active interconnection-queue capacity per GW of installed US generating capacity (end-2025) | 2025-12 | high | Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Queued Up: 2026 Edition (June 2026) | 2,061 / 1,374 = 1.50 (my arithmetic); LBNL's 1,374 GW installed figure is higher than EIA's 1,280,799 MW of utility-scale capacity at end-2025 (likely a nameplate versus net-summer or coverage difference), so the ratio is 1.5-1.6 depending on the denominator; with 13% historical completion the queue implies perhaps 270 GW of eventual builds (2,061 x 0.13). |
| Power generation and fuel → Grid, interconnection and transformers | 0.08 | accredited MW per nameplate MW (PJM ELCC, tracking solar, 2027/28) | 2027/2028 delivery year | high | PJM, ELCC Class Ratings for the 2027/2028 Base Residual Auction | Tracking solar is accredited at 8% and 4-hour storage at 58% of nameplate, so the 43.4 GW of solar and 24 GW of batteries planned nationally for 2026 would count for only about 3.5 GW and 13.9 GW of firm capacity under PJM's method (43.4 x 0.08; 24 x 0.58, my arithmetic, applied to a national figure for illustration). |
| Power generation and fuel → Power generation and fuel | 0.66 | capacity factor (MWh generated per MW-hour of capacity, newest US combined-cycle fleet, 2022) | 2022 | high | EIA, Today in Energy: Use of natural gas-fired generation differs in the United States by technology and region (February 22, 2024) | 1 MW of new combined-cycle capacity produced about 5,782 MWh per year at this rate (0.66 x 8,760 h, my arithmetic); the whole CCGT fleet averaged about 56% in 2022, and a data centre running near 100% load needs firm capacity sized well above its average draw. |
| Power generation and fuel → Grid, interconnection and transformers | 121.7 | $ per kW-year of accredited capacity (PJM 2027/28 capacity price converted from $/MW-day) | 2025-12-17 | high | PJM Inside Lines, PJM Auction Procures 134,479 MW of Generation Resources (December 17, 2025) | $333.44 per MW-day x 365 days / 1,000 kW per MW = $121.71 per kW-year (my arithmetic); this is what a 100 MW data centre's share of PJM capacity costs, about $12.2 million a year before the ELCC and load-forecast adjustments, and it is the price signal that new firm generation earns on top of energy revenue. |
| Wafers and advanced packaging → Power generation and fuel | 0.7 | kW per GPU, chip TDP only (H100 SXM) | 2026-09 | high | NVIDIA, H100 Tensor Core GPU product page, specifications table | Arithmetic: 700 W = 0.7 kW; this is the GPU module's maximum thermal design power alone, before CPUs, networking, fans and cooling overhead. The PCIe/NVL variant is 350-400 W. |
| Wafers and advanced packaging → Power generation and fuel | 1.2 | kW per GPU, chip TDP only (Blackwell GPU in the GB200 superchip) | 2024-03-22 | medium | Wccftech, NVIDIA's Fully-Enabled Blackwell B200 GPUs Consume Up To 1200W (Mar. 22, 2024), reporting NVIDIA GTC 2024 sessions | Arithmetic: 1,200 W = 1.2 kW for the full-spec Blackwell GPU used in GB200; the same report says the HGX/DGX B200 variant 'is optimized around 1000W' (1.0 kW) and B100 at 700 W. NVIDIA's own GB200 NVL72 page lists no power figure, so this is a press report of NVIDIA engineers' statements rather than a datasheet. |
| Applications and end demand → Power generation and fuel | 0.34 | Wh per average ChatGPT query | 2025-06 | medium | Sam Altman (OpenAI CEO) personal blog, 'The Gentle Singularity' (June 2025; the page shows no date) | The only OpenAI-attributed energy-per-query figure; no methodology is published and 'average query' is undefined, so treat as an order of magnitude. Arithmetic: 0.34 Wh x 1,000,000 queries = 340 kWh per million queries; at 900 million weekly users making one query a day each, 0.34 Wh x 900e6 = 306 MWh per day, about 12.8 MW of continuous load. |
| Applications and end demand → Power generation and fuel | 0.24 | Wh per median Gemini Apps text prompt | 2025-08-21 | medium | Google Cloud blog, 'Measuring the environmental impact of AI inference' (21 Aug 2025) | Google's own full-stack measurement (accelerators, host CPU and DRAM, idle capacity and data-centre overhead) for the median text prompt in the Gemini app in May 2025; a median, not a mean, so heavy prompts, image and video generation and agentic use are not represented. Arithmetic: 0.24 Wh x 1,000,000 prompts = 240 kWh per million prompts. |
Players
| Company | Ticker | Role | Listed | Note |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| GE Vernova | NYSE:GEV | Gas turbine and grid equipment maker | yes | Largest gas turbine supplier; 116 GW of gas equipment backlog plus slot reservations at Q2 2026, with output of 20 GW/yr rising to a targeted 30 GW in 2030. |
| Siemens Energy | ETR:ENR | Gas turbine and grid equipment maker | yes | Gas services backlog reached 69 GW at end-June 2026 after booking 15 GW of orders and shipping 6 GW in the quarter; the CFO says lead times now run three years or more. |
| Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (Mitsubishi Power) | TYO:7011 | Gas turbine maker | yes | Large-frame gas turbine backlog of 35 GW (up from 23 GW a year earlier), plans to double production capacity versus 2024, and orders booked in mid-2026 are scheduled for 2028-2030 delivery. |
| Constellation Energy | NASDAQ:CEG | Nuclear generator with hyperscaler PPAs | yes | Restarting the 835 MW Crane (Three Mile Island 1) plant for 2027 and signed a 20-year deal with Meta for 1,121 MW from Clinton starting June 2027, including a 30 MW uprate. |
| Vistra | NYSE:VST | Independent power producer (nuclear and gas) | yes | 20-year PPA for 1,200 MW from Comanche Peak with delivery from late 2027, and Meta will buy more than 2.1 GW from its Perry and Davis-Besse nuclear plants with 433 MW of uprates due in the early 2030s. |
| Talen Energy | NASDAQ:TLN | Independent power producer (nuclear) | yes | Supplying Amazon with 1,920 MW of nuclear power from Susquehanna through 2042, moving to a front-of-the-meter arrangement in spring 2026. |
| NextEra Energy | NYSE:NEE | Utility and renewables/nuclear developer | yes | Restarting the 615 MW Duane Arnold nuclear plant (closed 2020) by the first quarter of 2029 under a 25-year agreement with Google. |
| NRG Energy | NYSE:NRG | Independent power producer (gas) | yes | Partnership with GE Vernova and Kiewit to build up to 5.4 GW of combined-cycle gas for data centres, 1.2 GW in service by 2029 and another 1.2 GW by 2030; total contracted data-centre capacity 445 MW as of November 2025. |
| Bloom Energy | NYSE:BE | On-site fuel-cell power for data centres | yes | Says it can deliver on-site power for an entire data centre within 90 days and had deployed more than 400 MW at data centres by mid-2025; supplying Oracle Cloud Infrastructure sites. |
| Williams Companies | NYSE:WMB | Gas pipelines and behind-the-meter power | yes | Completed phase one of Socrates, its first behind-the-meter gas plant for a data centre in Ohio, with phase two due 4Q 2026; formed a $5.34 billion Power Innovation joint venture with Blackstone and guides 2026 adjusted EBITDA of $8.3-8.5 billion. |
| Kinder Morgan | NYSE:KMI | Gas pipelines | yes | $9.6 billion project backlog at end of Q2 2026, more than 60% tied to power generation and local distribution company demand. |
| EQT | NYSE:EQT | Natural gas producer (Appalachia) | yes | Signed a long-term supply agreement for a new 2 GW power plant in West Virginia and a 10-year deal to supply 325,000 Dth/d to the CPV Shay Energy Center at prices linked to PJM power. |
Signals
| Date | Kind | Actor | Counterparty | Claim | Value | Confidence | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-07-22 | buildout | GE Vernova | Gas turbine equipment backlog of 53 GW plus 63 GW of slot reservations, 116 GW in all, against output of about 20 GW a year; at least 125 GW under contract expected by the end of 2026 | 116 GW | confirmed | GE Vernova Q2 2026 results (Form 8-K, 2026-07-22) | |
| 2026-03-10 | policy | Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality | xAI | Air permit issued for 41 permanent gas turbines, about 1.2 GW, at the Southaven site, where roughly 20 turbines were already running | 1.2 GW | reported | E&E News (2026-03-10) |
| 2025-12-19 | policy | Georgia Public Service Commission | Georgia Power | Certified about 9,885 MW of new Georgia Power generation to serve large-load growth | 9,885 MW | reported | Perkins Coie summary of the PSC vote of 2025-12-19 (Dockets 56298 and 56310) |
| 2025-12-17 | price | PJM | The 2027/28 capacity auction cleared at the $333.44 per MW-day price cap with 134,479 MW procured, 6,623 MW short of the reliability requirement; PJM attributes nearly 5,100 MW of the higher requirement to data centres | 333.44 USD/MW-day | confirmed | PJM Inside Lines (2025-12-17) | |
| 2025-12-01 | buildout | Entergy Louisiana | Meta | Broke ground on two combined-cycle units of about 1,500 MW at Richland Parish for the Hyperion campus, both expected operational by late 2028 | 1,500 MW | confirmed | Entergy Louisiana newsroom (2025-12-01) |
| 2025-08-20 | policy | Louisiana Public Service Commission | Entergy Louisiana | Approved, 4 to 1, a settlement letting Entergy Louisiana build three combined-cycle gas plants and new transmission for the Meta campus (Docket U-37425) | 3 plants | reported | KNOE (2025-08-20) |