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4w ago

U.S. and EU Tackle Power Crunch to Fuel Gigawatt-Scale AI Data Centers

Federal permitting reforms in the U.S., matched by a €30 billion EU fund for gigawatt-scale AI data centers, aim to accelerate build-out; officials must secure financing alongside grid upgrades.

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Meta's data center in Newton County, Georgia

Overview

  • Anthropic warns the U.S. will need 50 gigawatts of new power capacity by 2028 for AI training and inference, and its federal-land use and streamlined review proposals are being incorporated into President Trump’s AI Action Plan.
  • The White House has initiated measures to fast-track data center and energy project permitting and is evaluating Department of Energy partnerships to accelerate transmission line and interconnection approvals.
  • The European Commission has allocated €10 billion to establish 13 AI data centers and earmarked an additional €20 billion for a network of gigawatt-class facilities, drawing 76 expressions of interest across 60 potential sites.
  • Each planned gigawatt data center is estimated to cost €3–5 billion and support over 100,000 advanced GPUs, placing unprecedented demands on power generation and transmission infrastructure.
  • With the first EU gigawatt-scale facilities set to come online in the coming weeks, both regions face the urgent task of securing billions in funding per site and undertaking major grid modernization.