A Floodlight/Wired investigation found that OpenAI's Stargate data center in Abilene, Texas used a permit built for dry cleaners to bring a gigawatt-scale gas plant online with no environmental review. Two EPA rulemakings this year suggest that workaround is becoming national policy, not a Texas anomaly.
The viral claim that one AI email drinks a bottle of water, and Sam Altman's teaspoon, are both misleading. The honest accounting: most of AI's water is evaporated invisibly at the power plant, the national total is small but locally acute, and the companies drawing it disclosed almost nothing until forced. A definitive look at what AI actually costs the tap.
SpaceX's IPO registration statement describes a plan to deploy orbital AI compute satellites as early as 2028, betting that space solves the power and cooling constraints strangling terrestrial AI infrastructure. The financials tell a more grounded story: the only profitable segment is Starlink broadband, which funds everything else.
The industry just commissioned a study to prove data centers don't raise your power bill. That it needed to is the story. In the first quarter of 2026 alone, local opposition killed at least 20 projects and $41.7 billion in planned investment, even as Morgan Stanley warns the grid is already heading 44 gigawatts short. The binding constraint on the AI buildout has moved from the balance sheet to the county planning board.