Elon Musk's xAI wins Mississippi power plant permit despite pollution concerns and backlash

Elon Musk's xAI wins permit to build power plant in Mississippi despite pollution concerns

In Southaven, near Memphis, Tennessee, xAI is planning to construct a large data center dubbed Macrohardrr. Elon Musk's xAI scored a victory in Mississippi, where regulators on Tuesday authorized the artificial intelligence company to build a power plant with 41 natural gas-burning turbines in the town of Southaven to power its nearby data centers. The Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) held a board meeting earlier in the day to vote on whether to issue the permit. The NAACP and other civil rights and environmental advocates tried to get the meeting delayed, arguing that it would conflict with some residents' efforts to vote in the state's primary elections, being held on the same day. "We are outraged that, despite the community's clear demand to move the Election Day hearing, MDEQ chose to bulldoze through a decision that silenced the very residents most harmed by it," said Abre' Conner, director of environmental and climate justice at NAACP, in a statement from his organization and the Southern Environmental Law Center. The MDEQ didn't immediately respond to a request for information about the hearing. Now owned by SpaceX after a merger was announced in February, xAI has been using more than a dozen temporary turbines for months at the facility in Southaven, claiming that no federal permit has been required. The company has two data centers -- Colossus 1 and Colossus 2 -- in Memphis, Tennessee, just across the Mississippi state line.

Residents Raise Alarms as Mississippi Approves Turbines for Musk's xAI

Demetri Carter is among the residents of Southaven, Miss., who moved there for a quieter life away from nearby Memphis, where the news seemed dominated by crime and political malfeasance. She had been vaguely aware when Elon Musk's artificial intelligence company began acquiring land in Memphis in 2024 for two data centers. But she was taken aback when the company, xAI, suddenly parked a fleet of temporary turbines about two-tenths of a mile from her home to help power them. "It's quiet, it is peaceful, and then all of a sudden, all of this," said Ms. Carter, 60, who has taken to hitting the road on weekends, rather than staying at home and enduring a sound that she and others liken to roaring jet engines. Ms. Carter, along with more than 250 people, came to a recent hearing and pleaded with state officials to reject the company's bid to permanently operate 41 gas turbines in Southaven. But this week, Mississippi regulators unanimously approved the permit. The power provided by the turbines will help the supercomputer that trains xAI's chatbot, Grok. The unhappiness in Southaven, a city of nearly 60,000 people in a politically conservative county, is the latest evidence of the growing international backlash against data centers powering artificial intelligence. State and local officials are often eager to capitalize on billions of dollars in tech investment, while residents and environmental activists cite a long list of potential harms, including that the centers will guzzle water and force up electricity bills.

Elon Musk's xAI wants to build a power plant in Mississippi. Regulators plan a key meeting on Election Day

Elon Musk waves to the crowd during the 56th annual World Economic Forum (WEF) meeting in Davos, Switzerland, January 22, 2026. With Elon Musk's xAI planning to build a massive, natural-gas burning power plant in Southaven, Mississippi, the state's environmental authority has scheduled a board meeting for Tuesday -- Election Day for the 2026 primaries -- to decide whether to grant the company key permits. The NAACP and other civil rights and environmental advocates tried to get the meeting delayed, arguing that it was being rushed and would conflict with some residents' efforts to vote. The groups also said that by holding the meeting in Jackson, nearly 200 miles away from Southaven, those directly effected by the plant are impeded from attending. "This is not only a civic duty conundrum, but an unnecessary financial burden to Black residents and individuals who live in low-income and other communities near the facility," the NAACP wrote in a letter to the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) that's dated March 8, but was released publicly on Monday. They asked that the hearing be rescheduled and moved to a site closer to the proposed facility. The MDEQ denied the request on Monday, writing in a response to the NAACP that its permit board "regularly meets on the second Tuesday of each month, which has been the standard practice for decades," and that the regulator, "considers matters on a statewide basis." A copy of the letter was shared with CNBC. The meeting is set to take place a little over a month after Musk merged xAI with SpaceX, his reusable rocket company, in a transaction that valued the combined entity at $1.25 trillion. Since starting xAI in 2023, Musk has tried to turn the AI company into an OpenAI competitor in the booming generative AI market.

Musk's xAI wins permit for data center's makeshift power plant despite backlash

Billionaire's artificial intelligence company gets approval to run 41 methane gas turbines at its 'Colossus 2' in Mississippi Elon Musk's artificial intelligence company xAI won approval on Tuesday to run 41 methane gas turbines at its "Colossus 2" data center in northern Mississippi. That's nearly double the amount it has been operating. The turbines will help power xAI's massive data centers, which house the company's "AI supercomputers", or giant arrays of advanced chips, which in turn power the controversial AI tool Grok, the company's most recognizable product. The decision, made by the Mississippi department of environmental quality, MDEQ, comes amid major public opposition to the data center, which demands enormous amounts of electricity. Community members and environmental advocates say the cluster of gas generators will contribute to hazardous air pollution in Southaven, Mississippi. "We are outraged," said Abre' Conner, the director of environmental and climate justice for the NAACP. "MDEQ chose to bulldoze through a decision that silenced the very residents most harmed by it." Since xAI fired up Colossus 2 last year, bringing in unpermitted turbines, residents have complained of noise and air quality issues. At a public hearing held by MDEQ in Southaven last month, hundreds of people packed the room to express concerns over xAI's impact on the community. According to NBC, no one spoke in favor of MDEQ granting the permit. "The scale, the speed, the intensity of this expansion are unlike anything this area has absorbed," said Southaven resident Nathan Reed, per NBC. "This was not a thoughtful, phased development. It was an industrial surge imposed on our residential community." The NAACP, which has instigated a lawsuit against xAI over Colossus 2's pollution, says the MDEQ rushed its decision and dismissed community concerns. "It's shocking that a state agency and board would refuse to address an unnecessary civic crisis, prioritizing convenience over justice," Conner said. Amid similar community outcry, xAI set up its first datacenter in Memphis in 2024. It's an enormous facility named "Colossus" that's roughly the size of 13 football fields. Tennessee regulators granted a permit for 15 gas generators there last July. The company is additionally building a third datacenter in the city, dubbed "Macrohardrr". The gas generators that xAI is using emit fine particulate matter that contains hazardous chemicals such as formaldehyde and nitrogen oxide, according to environmental groups. These pollutants are tied to an increase in diseases, such as asthma, respiratory illness, heart attacks and certain cancers. The areas where xAI's data centers are located already struggle with pollution, with the American Lung Association giving an "F" grade to both DeSoto and Shelby counties. The Southern Environmental Law Center says xAI's 41 turbines in Southaven will likely make Colossus 2 one of the largest fossil fuel power plants in Mississippi and one of the area's biggest polluters. "Mississippi state regulators appear to be more interested in fast-tracking xAI's personal power plant than conducting a thorough review of its impacts and having meaningful engagement with the families that will be forced to live with this dirty facility," said Patrick Anderson, a senior attorney at the Southern Environmental Law Center. The MDEQ and xAI didn't immediately return requests for comment.