US Data Center Tracker: Six September Milestones, From a 2 GW Pennsylvania Campus to a Contested Colorado Permit

September at a glance

1. Aligned's Project Phoenix pairs a 2 GW campus with its own power plan

• Investment: Aligned describes about $10B in regional economic investment. That figure is the developer's economic-impact estimate; a breakdown of project capital spending has not been published. 1
• Power: Three facilities are planned for 2 GW in total. Aligned will supply the campus from a dedicated onsite power source and expects the completed project to return substantial excess capacity to the regional grid. The arrangement is a design commitment made at groundbreaking, and the generating equipment behind it has not been detailed. 12
• Jobs: Aligned estimates about 3,000 construction jobs and about 640 full-time operations positions, with thousands more indirect roles through suppliers and contractors. 1
• Community response: Each facility is designed to use no water for operational cooling, with a closed-loop system that continuously recycles deionized water. Aligned says it is pursuing Green Globes certification with the Green Building Initiative and following Pennsylvania's Responsible Infrastructure Development (GRID) requirements, and that it has signed the Ratepayer Protection Pledge. Shippingport Mayor John Erickson framed the project as rebuilding a historic energy site. 13

2. Fluidstack holds a worksite permit in Cameron County, with the building permits still to come

• Investment: The first phase is valued at $4B. Fluidstack has requested no local property-tax abatement and no county incentive, according to the project account published by Construction Review Online. 5
• Power: The campus's critical IT load has not been disclosed, and no anchor tenant has been identified. The site runs east of FM 509 and west of FM 106, between Gomez Road and FM 1596. AEP Texas will provide transmission, with Fluidstack funding its own electrical infrastructure. Texas Senate Bill 6 covers interconnections where demand at a single site exceeds 75 MW, and Gov. Greg Abbott's Aug. 3 directive puts every data center in the ERCOT interconnection queue through an audit before it can advance. 5
• Jobs: Fluidstack expects more than 2,500 construction jobs and several hundred permanent jobs, with phase one targeted for completion in mid-2028. 45
• Community response: The Sept. 10 document is a worksite permit. It authorizes land clearing, grading, utility installation, streets, parking areas and stormwater infrastructure; building permits are still outstanding. Harlingen's city commission tabled a Fluidstack stormwater request on Sept. 2. That package proposed about $7M to widen a 90-foot city-owned canal serving the airport plus about $20M for city infrastructure. Commissioners required a public town hall before another vote, and eight days later Fluidstack said it would pursue an alternative discharge route. Water will come from the East Rio Hondo Water Supply Corporation at about 50,000 gallons a day during construction, falling to roughly 7,000 gallons a day in operation, using closed-loop cooling. The City of Rio Hondo said on Sept. 1 that it holds no agreements with any data-center developer and that the site lies outside its jurisdiction. 5

3. Applied Digital names the Delta Forge 2 site in Alabama and the terms that come with it

• Investment: The Tuscaloosa County Industrial Development Authority's project fact sheet puts the initial capital investment at $3.2865B, described as investment from Applied Digital and its tenant. 6
• Power: The campus carries 210 MW of critical IT load under a 15-year take-or-pay lease signed in June with a US-based high-investment-grade hyperscaler, representing about $5.2B in base-term contracted revenue, or about $12.7B if renewal options run the term to 30 years. Applied Digital has not named the tenant. The company reports roughly 1.4 GW of critical IT load under long-term leases across its five campuses. 8
• Jobs: Construction employment is expected to peak above 1,000 workers. The operating campus is expected to support 101 full-time positions and about $129.5M in payroll over 20 years. 67
• Community response: Applied Digital has committed $270M in community-benefit payments to the Tuscaloosa County Economic Development Authority over 20 years, alongside about $170.7M in projected taxes paid and roughly $314.5M in total tax abatements. WBRC reports about $131.5M in education taxes over the same period. The payments are distributed to the entities whose taxes are abated, including Brookwood, Tuscaloosa, Northport and Tuscaloosa County. The announcement followed months of public concern about water use, noise, stormwater runoff and the size of the development. Applied Digital says the campus uses waterless cooling, and its executive vice president for external affairs said the company would handle retention carefully and work on Hurricane Creek. Tuscaloosa County Commission chairman Rob Robertson said he expects further town halls. 67

4. Crusoe confirms it is developing Google's campus in Armstrong County

• Investment: Crusoe has published no campus cost. Aterio Research, a third-party firm whose figures Data Center Dynamics cites, puts the total investment near $29B; Crusoe has not confirmed that number. Four of the planned buildings are each filed at 805,380 square feet and two at roughly 485,000 square feet. 10
• Power: The campus connects directly to Serena's adjacent Goodnight 1 wind farm, which is operational at 265.5 MW, and to Goodnight 2, under construction for the same capacity and catalyzed by Crusoe's development. Surplus generation flows to the grid. Aterio estimates more than 1 GW across seven buildings, split into a 530 MW first phase and a 500 MW second phase. 910
• Jobs: Not disclosed.
• Community response: Google and Crusoe held an open house for Armstrong County residents on Sept. 23. Crusoe's senior director of development said the campus would include six buildings, and project officials described construction timelines and told residents that water would come from nearby neighbors. 11

5. Meta's Eagle Mountain expansion takes its Utah spending past $3B

• Investment: Meta's cumulative Utah investment now exceeds $3B, and the company says it has invested more than $50M in local roads and water infrastructure since breaking ground in 2018. It reports $6.2M contributed to local schools and organizations to date. 12
• Power: The new buildings use closed-loop liquid cooling with dry cooling, which Meta says removes operational water use from the cooling system. The company says it has added more than 1.7 GW of clean and renewable energy and 600 MWh of battery storage across 13 Utah sites, and that it supports the Faraday Energy Storage project, a 150 MW battery owned and operated by Lydian Energy. 12
• Jobs: Meta expects more than 1,200 construction workers at the peak of construction and more than 300 jobs at the data center once complete. 1213
• Community response: Meta is committing $450,000 toward the Walden Park Astronomy Park, bringing its contributions there to $700,000, and $600,000 to buy three acres for a future elementary school with the Lake Mountain School District. It is also committing $1.5M to the Lake Mountain Education Foundation plus $50,000 a year, and has given $4.85M to the city's affordable housing fund. The contested side sits in the tax arithmetic: Utah News Dispatch reported that Eagle Mountain nearly doubled its property tax rate this year to raise about $2.1M, an amount close to the $2.5M a year the city forgoes under Meta's tax incentives, and that the first phase carries about $150M in incentives over 40 years with the 567-acre expansion eligible to receive back about $780M over the same span. 1214

6. Weld County approves a Colorado project over hundreds of objections

• Investment: Not disclosed.
• Power: Poudre Valley Rural Electric Association gave Global AI a will-serve letter for 35 MW, and the data center is expected to start at 27.5 MW in its first phase. Global AI aims for 1 GW of capacity across its network by 2029. 15
• Jobs: Global AI estimates about 1,500 construction jobs and 200 long-term jobs for the county. The company operates one data center in New York and has three others under contract. 15
• Community response: The county received more than 400 written comments, mostly in opposition, and an attorney for a neighbouring developer testified that 600 acres west of the site are planned and zoned for 2,000 homes. Opponents also questioned whether the will-serve letter identifies how the power can physically be delivered. The permit requires closed-loop cooling with an initial fill of about 65,000 gallons and an annual top-off of about 6,500 gallons, a noise limit at existing ambient levels around the site, and a bond covering decommissioning costs. Global AI's attorney said the facility would operate around 65 decibels and exceed that only during emergency generator use. 1517

What September changed

1. Power is arriving as part of the project. Aligned plans Project Phoenix at 2 GW on a dedicated onsite source beside a redeveloped power station, with excess capacity returned to the grid. Crusoe's Armstrong County campus connects directly to two 265.5 MW wind farms. Fluidstack says it will fund its own transmission through AEP Texas. Meta's Utah expansion is matched by more than 1.7 GW of contracted renewables and a 150 MW battery. Campus load, generation, storage and transmission measure different things, and each project now publishes at least one of them. 15912
2. The permit a project holds says more than the headline it issued. Fluidstack's Sept. 10 document authorizes clearing, grading and stormwater work, with building permits still to come. Weld County's approval is a use-by-special-review permit carrying cooling, noise and decommissioning conditions. Applied Digital's Brookwood campus has an identified site, a signed 210 MW lease and a construction start set for Oct. 1. A groundbreaking, a permit with conditions and a site confirmation are three different stages of the same word, "approved." 5615
3. Local process is where the terms get set, and September supplied a yes, a pause and a payment schedule. Weld County approved a contested project after writing conditions into the permit. Palm Beach County commissioners voted 6–0 on Sept. 24 to pause new applications for data centers of 50 MW or more in unincorporated areas for up to a year, following months of opposition to the proposed Project Tango expansion near homes and an elementary school; an earlier approval for two 100,000-square-foot buildings stood, and applications the county had already deemed sufficient could continue under the previous rules. Applied Digital answered its local questions with $270M in community-benefit payments set against about $314.5M in abatements. 61518
4. Disclosure stays uneven on the fields a reader would want to compare. Crusoe's announcement names a developer, an end user and a wind connection, while the campus cost and the capacity figure come from a third-party researcher. Fluidstack publishes a $4B phase value and daily water volumes, and withholds its IT load and its tenant. Global AI published no investment figure at all. Four of the six entries carry "not disclosed" on at least one core field, which is itself the comparison a reader can act on. 591015

October watch list

• Aligned Project Phoenix: the onsite generation build behind the 2 GW figure, any Pennsylvania siting or grid filing, and detail behind the $10B economic-impact estimate.
• Fluidstack Cameron County: building permits, a documented stormwater outfall after Harlingen tabled the $27M package, an anchor tenant, and project financing.
• Applied Digital Delta Forge 2: whether construction starts on the Oct. 1 schedule, and the identity of the hyperscaler behind the 210 MW lease.
• Crusoe's Goodnight Campus: confirmation of the cost and capacity figures, and further filings under the Crusoe affiliate GN DC1 LLC.
• Meta Eagle Mountain: the permanent hiring count as construction closes, and whether the city revisits the incentive terms alongside its tax rate.
• Global AI in Weld County: whether the first data hall reaches operation by year-end, and how Colorado's local pauses affect the rest of the company's pipeline.
• Palm Beach County: the permanent rules the county writes during its one-year pause, and which large Florida projects fall inside the 50 MW threshold.