The US data center market in one read: the size of the market, the 25 largest operators, the money behind the build, and the power problem slowing it, so readers skip the filings and forecasts.
IT load refers to the power consumed by IT equipment in the data center (servers, racks, etc) as opposed to power consumed by everything else in the data center (cooling, UPS/power-distribution losses, lighting, security). The key difference between AI load vs other data center load is the power density or the amount of power used by IT equipment. AI load has higher power density (i.e. IT equipment for AI workloads requires more power) which results in AI data centers using more power than data centers which are primarily for non-AI workloads (i.e. colocation, cloud).
My estimate is about a 100GW gap in supply, in 2030, after subtracting firm power from the grid and behind the meter. How does it compare to your estimates?
100GW is a bit on the high side in my view. Given current capacity of 30GW in the US and projections to double over the next 5-7yrs to 60GW and actual new supply of ~5GW annually, the gap is likely to be ~30GW in 5 years.
"By facilities: 17.2 gigawatts of active IT load across 2,396 data centers (ABI Research, 2025)."
What is the definition of IT load? Is it different than AI data center load? I'm trying to differentiate between AI load and other data center load.
IT load refers to the power consumed by IT equipment in the data center (servers, racks, etc) as opposed to power consumed by everything else in the data center (cooling, UPS/power-distribution losses, lighting, security). The key difference between AI load vs other data center load is the power density or the amount of power used by IT equipment. AI load has higher power density (i.e. IT equipment for AI workloads requires more power) which results in AI data centers using more power than data centers which are primarily for non-AI workloads (i.e. colocation, cloud).
Thanks, that clears it up.
My estimate is about a 100GW gap in supply, in 2030, after subtracting firm power from the grid and behind the meter. How does it compare to your estimates?
100GW is a bit on the high side in my view. Given current capacity of 30GW in the US and projections to double over the next 5-7yrs to 60GW and actual new supply of ~5GW annually, the gap is likely to be ~30GW in 5 years.