Pennsylvania's Largest Coal Plant to Become Massive AI-Powered Data Center Campus

PA's largest coal plant to become 4.5GW gas-fired AI hub

Developers on Wednesday announced plans to bring up to 4.5 gigawatts of natural gas-fired power online by 2027 at the site of what was once Pennsylvania's largest coal plant, as part of a proposed datacenter campus running AI and high-performance computing workloads. Development of the 3,200-acre natural gas-powered datacenter campus is being led by Homer City Redevelopment (HCR) and is expected to exceed $10 billion for power infrastructure and site readiness alone, with additional billions anticipated for the datacenter development. As we understand it, the plant and server campus will be next to each other, as depicted in this video. The power station site will need rebuilding not only to turn it into a gas-fired system but also because it's pretty much demolished, save for electrical infrastructure such as transmission lines that can be reused. HCR has yet to disclose a tenant for what's hoped to be a massive datacenter complex, with its emphasis for now largely on building out the energy infrastructure and datacenter shell in anticipation of future demand. The project's backers, including Knighthead Capital Management, appear confident that demand will follow, with the campus designed to deliver up to 4.5 gigawatts of power to run AI and hyperscale workloads. Power for the facility will be provided by seven General Electric Vernova Turbines, which will run on either natural gas or -- assuming we can work out the kinks in the green-hydrogen supply chain -- H. Until that happens, the site won't exactly be a bright spot on hyperscalers' annual sustainability reports, though HCR claims the gas turbines will cut greenhouse gas emissions by 60-65 percent per megawatt-hour compared to the plant's retired coal units. Kiewit Power Constructors is expected to begin work on the facility later this year with the first generators installed in 2026; the site is expected to start generating power by 2027 -- just in time for Nvidia's 600 kilowatt Kyber racks to make their debut. Building at the former Homer City Generating Station has its advantages. The decommissioned - read: leveled - 2-gigawatt coal plant still has much of the critical infrastructure necessary to support a gas generator plant including, as we indicated, transmission lines, substations, and water access. In total the developers anticipate the project creating more than 10,000 new construction jobs and approximately 1,000 "direct and indirect" technology, operations, and energy infrastructure roles. The Homer City datacenter complex is one of a growing number of large-scale power projects designed to address AI's exploding appetite for power. For example, Meta announced a AI datacenter campus in Richland Parish, Louisiana. The project was accompanied by a collaboration with Entergy to install three combined-cycle combustion turbines totaling 2.2 gigawatts of generation capacity to support the development. Like the Homer City development, these generators also have the potential to be transitioned over to hydrogen fuel. Microsoft, meanwhile, is working with Constellation Energy, aiming to bring the idled Three Mile Island Unit 1 fission reactor back online as part of a 20-year power purchase agreement aimed at ensuring a steady supply of clean energy for its own bit barns. Amazon has gone nuclear with the $650 million acquisition of Cumulus Data's atomic datacenters at the site of the Susquehanna nuclear power plant in northeast Pennsylvania. Meta and Oracle are talking up nuclear projects, with the former looking to purchase upwards of four gigawatts of fission power by the early 2030s, and the latter looking to power a one gigawatt datacenter using a trio of small modular reactors (SMRs). However, as we just explored, the sudden resurgence of interest in nuclear has no shortage of roadblocks ranging from regulatory hurdles and public perception to the economic realities posed by SMRs. ®

Pennsylvania's largest coal-fired power plant, now retired, to become gas-powered data center campus

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) -- The owners of what was once Pennsylvania's biggest coal-fired power plant said Wednesday that they will turn it into a $10 billion natural gas-powered data center campus designed to capitalize on the fast-growing energy demands of Big Tech companies to power artificial intelligence and cloud computing applications. The former Homer City Generating Station, about 50 miles (80 kilometers) east of Pittsburgh, will host seven gas-fired turbines to power data centers on site with up to 4.5 gigawatts of electricity, according to the owners, an investor group named Homer City Development. That amount of electricity is enough to power about 3 million homes. Construction is expected to begin this year and power could start flowing by 2027, the group said in a statement. The cost to prepare the site and build the data centers could exceed the initial $10 billion investment by billions more, the group said. Much of the critical infrastructure for the project is already in place from the shuttered Homer City power plant, including transmission lines connected to the mid-Atlantic and New York power grids, substations and water access, the group said. The developers were awarded a $5 million state grant to extend a gas line to the property, which sits atop the prolific Marcellus Shale natural gas reservoir. Last month, the group demolished the three cooling towers and four smokestacks still standing from the former coal plant. It shut down in 2023 after 54 years in operation. The owners, Homer City Development, blamed competition with cheaper natural gas, unseasonably warm winters that demanded less power, the rising cost of coal and increasingly expensive environmental regulations. The late 2022 debut of OpenAI's ChatGPT -- built with help from Microsoft's data centers -- ignited worldwide demand for chatbots and other generative AI products that typically require large amounts of computing power to train and operate. That has sent Big Tech companies in search of new power sources, spurred interest in a new wave of nuclear reactors, revived interest in building new gas-fired plants and stoked concerns among states and federal regulators about electricity shortages. It's also prompted utilities to delay the retirements of aging power plants and to bring nuclear power plants out of retirement, including last year's announcement that the shuttered Three Mile Island nuclear power plant will reopen under a 20-year agreement to feed Microsoft's data centers.

Pennsylvania's largest coal-fired power plant, now retired, to become gas-powered data center campus

The owners of what was once Pennsylvania's biggest coal-fired power plant said Wednesday that they will turn it into a $10 billion natural gas-powered data center campus designed to capitalize on the fast-growing energy demands of Big Tech companies to power artificial intelligence and cloud computing applications. The former Homer City Generating Station, about 50 miles (80 kilometers) east of Pittsburgh, will host seven gas-fired turbines to power data centers on site with up to 4.5 gigawatts of electricity, according to the owners, an investor group named Homer City Development. That amount of electricity is enough to power about 3 million homes. Construction is expected to begin this year and power could start flowing by 2027, the group said in a statement. The cost to prepare the site and build the data centers could exceed the initial $10 billion investment by billions more, the group said. Much of the critical infrastructure for the project is already in place from the shuttered Homer City power plant, including transmission lines connected to the mid-Atlantic and New York power grids, substations and water access, the group said. The developers were awarded a $5 million state grant to extend a gas line to the property, which sits atop the prolific Marcellus Shale natural gas reservoir. Last month, the group demolished the three cooling towers and four smokestacks still standing from the former coal plant. It shut down in 2023 after 54 years in operation. The owners, Homer City Development, blamed competition with cheaper natural gas, unseasonably warm winters that demanded less power, the rising cost of coal and increasingly expensive environmental regulations. The late 2022 debut of OpenAI's ChatGPT -- built with help from Microsoft's data centers -- ignited worldwide demand for chatbots and other generative AI products that typically require large amounts of computing power to train and operate. That has sent Big Tech companies in search of new power sources, spurred interest in a new wave of nuclear reactors, revived interest in building new gas-fired plants and stoked concerns among states and federal regulators about electricity shortages. It's also prompted utilities to delay the retirements of aging power plants and to bring nuclear power plants out of retirement, including last year's announcement that the shuttered Three Mile Island nuclear power plant will reopen under a 20-year agreement to feed Microsoft's data centers. © 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

A coal plant in Pennsylvania was imploded to build an AI data center

Pennsylvania's former largest coal plant was imploded to make space to build a data center campus. The former Homer City Generating Station will be turned into a gas-powered data center campus to meet the growing demands for artificial intelligence and high-performance computing, Homer City Redevelopment (HCR) and Kiewit Power Constructors Co. said Wednesday. The Homer City Energy Campus will be more than 3,200 acres, and GE Vernova (GE-1.76%) will support the project with seven hydrogen-enabled, gas-fired turbines -- the first of which are expected to be delivered starting next year. HCR, which owned the coal plant, started taking down its cooling towers and stacks late last month, the Wall Street Journal (NWSA-0.48%) reported. The data center campus is expected to start construction this year, with hopes that it will be able to generate power by 2027. According to HCR and Kiewit, the campus will deliver up to 4.5 gigawatts of power -- enough to power more than three million average U.S. households. Kiewit is building the Homer City Energy Campus, and the Marcellus Shale region will provide it with natural gas. In addition to supporting large data center customers, the campus will be able to supply power to thousands of local homes on the grid, the companies said. The project is expected to receive an initial capital investment of more than $10 billion that will go toward infrastructure, followed by "billions more" to build the data centers. The investment will be the largest of its kind in Pennsylvania's history, according to the companies. In the first eight months of 2024, Microsoft (MSFT-0.02%), Meta (META+0.55%), Google (GOOGL-0.10%), and Amazon (AMZN-0.43%) spent a combined $125 billion on investing in and running AI data centers, according to a JPMorgan (JPM+0.45%) report citing New Street Research. This year, those companies plan to spend even more on AI -- a combined $320 billion, according to statements by their CEOs. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in January that the company is building a data center with a capacity of more than two gigawatts -- a site that could cover a large part of Manhattan.

Former Homer City Generating Station to become massive gas-powered campus for AI, data centers

Less than two weeks after the smokestacks and towers were imploded at the former Homer City Generating Station in Indiana County, the owners on Wednesday announced plans to turn what was once Pennsylvania's biggest coal-fired power plant into a $10 billion natural gas-powered data center campus. The project is designed to capitalize on the fast-growing energy demands of Big Tech companies to power artificial intelligence and cloud computing applications. It will host seven gas-fired turbines to power data centers on site with up to 4.5 gigawatts of electricity, according to the owners, an investor group named Homer City Development. That amount of electricity is enough to power about 3 million homes and would be the nation's third-largest power generation facility after the Grand Coulee hydroelectric dam in Washington and the new Plant Vogtle nuclear power plant in Georgia, according to federal data. Construction is expected to begin this year and power could start flowing by 2027, the group said in a statement. The cost to prepare the site and build the data centers could exceed the initial $10 billion investment by billions more, the group said. It could also supply electricity to the wider power grid, it said. Much of the critical infrastructure for the project is already in place from the shuttered Homer City power plant, including transmission lines connected to the mid-Atlantic and New York power grids, substations and water access, the group said. The developers were awarded a $5 million state grant to extend a gas line to the property, which sits atop the prolific Marcellus Shale natural gas reservoir. Last month, the group demolished the three cooling towers and four smokestacks still standing from the former coal plant. It shut down in 2023 after 54 years in operation. The owners, Homer City Development, blamed competition with cheaper natural gas, unseasonably warm winters that demanded less power, the rising cost of coal and increasingly expensive environmental regulations. The late 2022 debut of OpenAI's ChatGPT -- built with help from Microsoft's data centers -- ignited worldwide demand for chatbots and other generative AI products that typically require large amounts of computing power to train and operate. That has sent Big Tech companies in search of new power sources, spurred interest in a new wave of nuclear reactors, revived interest in building new gas-fired plants and stoked concerns among states and federal regulators about electricity shortages. It's also prompted utilities to delay the retirements of aging power plants and to bring nuclear power plants out of retirement, including last year's announcement that the shuttered Three Mile Island nuclear power plant will reopen under a 20-year agreement to feed Microsoft's data centers.

Pennsylvania's largest coal-fired power plant, now retired, to become gas-powered data center campus

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) -- The owners of what was once Pennsylvania's biggest coal-fired power plant said Wednesday that they will turn it into a $10 billion natural gas-powered data center campus designed to capitalize on the fast-growing energy demands of Big Tech companies to power artificial intelligence and cloud computing applications. The former Homer City Generating Station, about 50 miles (80 kilometers) east of Pittsburgh, will host seven gas-fired turbines to power data centers on site with up to 4.5 gigawatts of electricity, according to the owners, an investor group named Homer City Development. That amount of electricity is enough to power about 3 million homes. Construction is expected to begin this year and power could start flowing by 2027, the group said in a statement. The cost to prepare the site and build the data centers could exceed the initial $10 billion investment by billions more, the group said. Much of the critical infrastructure for the project is already in place from the shuttered Homer City power plant, including transmission lines connected to the mid-Atlantic and New York power grids, substations and water access, the group said. The developers were awarded a $5 million state grant to extend a gas line to the property, which sits atop the prolific Marcellus Shale natural gas reservoir. Last month, the group demolished the three cooling towers and four smokestacks still standing from the former coal plant. It shut down in 2023 after 54 years in operation. The owners, Homer City Development, blamed competition with cheaper natural gas, unseasonably warm winters that demanded less power, the rising cost of coal and increasingly expensive environmental regulations. The late 2022 debut of OpenAI's ChatGPT -- built with help from Microsoft's data centers -- ignited worldwide demand for chatbots and other generative AI products that typically require large amounts of computing power to train and operate. That has sent Big Tech companies in search of new power sources, spurred interest in a new wave of nuclear reactors, revived interest in building new gas-fired plants and stoked concerns among states and federal regulators about electricity shortages. It's also prompted utilities to delay the retirements of aging power plants and to bring nuclear power plants out of retirement, including last year's announcement that the shuttered Three Mile Island nuclear power plant will reopen under a 20-year agreement to feed Microsoft's data centers.

Pennsylvania's largest coal-fired power plant, now retired, to become gas-powered data center campus

HARRISBURG, Pa. -- The owners of what was once Pennsylvania's biggest coal-fired power plant said Wednesday that they will turn it into a $10 billion natural gas-powered data center campus designed to capitalize on the fast-growing energy demands of Big Tech companies to power artificial intelligence and cloud computing applications. The former Homer City Generating Station, about 50 miles (80 kilometers) east of Pittsburgh, will host seven gas-fired turbines to power data centers on site with up to 4.5 gigawatts of electricity, according to the owners, an investor group named Homer City Development. That amount of electricity is enough to power about 3 million homes. Construction is expected to begin this year and power could start flowing by 2027, the group said in a statement. The cost to prepare the site and build the data centers could exceed the initial $10 billion investment by billions more, the group said. Much of the critical infrastructure for the project is already in place from the shuttered Homer City power plant, including transmission lines connected to the mid-Atlantic and New York power grids, substations and water access, the group said. The developers were awarded a $5 million state grant to extend a gas line to the property, which sits atop the prolific Marcellus Shale natural gas reservoir. Last month, the group demolished the three cooling towers and four smokestacks still standing from the former coal plant. It shut down in 2023 after 54 years in operation. The owners, Homer City Development, blamed competition with cheaper natural gas, unseasonably warm winters that demanded less power, the rising cost of coal and increasingly expensive environmental regulations. The late 2022 debut of OpenAI's ChatGPT -- built with help from Microsoft's data centers -- ignited worldwide demand for chatbots and other generative AI products that typically require large amounts of computing power to train and operate. That has sent Big Tech companies in search of new power sources, spurred interest in a new wave of nuclear reactors, revived interest in building new gas-fired plants and stoked concerns among states and federal regulators about electricity shortages. It's also prompted utilities to delay the retirements of aging power plants and to bring nuclear power plants out of retirement, including last year's announcement that the shuttered Three Mile Island nuclear power plant will reopen under a 20-year agreement to feed Microsoft's data centers.

Pennsylvania's Largest Coal-Fired Power Plant, Now Retired, to Become Gas-Powered Data Center Campus

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) -- The owners of what was once Pennsylvania's biggest coal-fired power plant said Wednesday that they will turn it into a $10 billion natural gas-powered data center campus designed to capitalize on the fast-growing energy demands of Big Tech companies to power artificial intelligence and cloud computing applications. The former Homer City Generating Station, about 50 miles (80 kilometers) east of Pittsburgh, will host seven gas-fired turbines to power data centers on site with up to 4.5 gigawatts of electricity, according to the owners, an investor group named Homer City Development. That amount of electricity is enough to power about 3 million homes. Construction is expected to begin this year and power could start flowing by 2027, the group said in a statement. The cost to prepare the site and build the data centers could exceed the initial $10 billion investment by billions more, the group said. Much of the critical infrastructure for the project is already in place from the shuttered Homer City power plant, including transmission lines connected to the mid-Atlantic and New York power grids, substations and water access, the group said. The developers were awarded a $5 million state grant to extend a gas line to the property, which sits atop the prolific Marcellus Shale natural gas reservoir. Last month, the group demolished the three cooling towers and four smokestacks still standing from the former coal plant. It shut down in 2023 after 54 years in operation. The owners, Homer City Development, blamed competition with cheaper natural gas, unseasonably warm winters that demanded less power, the rising cost of coal and increasingly expensive environmental regulations. The late 2022 debut of OpenAI's ChatGPT -- built with help from Microsoft's data centers -- ignited worldwide demand for chatbots and other generative AI products that typically require large amounts of computing power to train and operate. That has sent Big Tech companies in search of new power sources, spurred interest in a new wave of nuclear reactors, revived interest in building new gas-fired plants and stoked concerns among states and federal regulators about electricity shortages. It's also prompted utilities to delay the retirements of aging power plants and to bring nuclear power plants out of retirement, including last year's announcement that the shuttered Three Mile Island nuclear power plant will reopen under a 20-year agreement to feed Microsoft's data centers. Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Huge AI data centre planned for Pennsylvania coal plant site

A huge natural gas-powered data center that will serve the growing demands of artificial intelligence is being planned for the site of a former coal-fired power plant in Pennsylvania. The 3,200-acre (1,295-hectare) data center campus, located about 50 miles east of Pittsburgh, will be developed at the location of Homer City Generation, previously the state's largest coal plant, Homer City Redevelopment and Kiewit Power Constructors Co. said Wednesday in a statement. The initial capital expenditure on power infrastructure and site readiness is estimated to exceed $10 billion, the companies said. Hedge fund Knighthead Capital Management is leading the financing of the project. The Homer City campus is one of the most ambitious projects to emerge amid a boom in power demand from AI and other end-use sectors. The scramble to construct more capacity is increasingly focusing on natural gas, which is readily available across the US and -- despite being a fossil fuel -- gives lower emissions than coal when burned. The plan for the Homer City campus includes the generation of as much as 4.5 gigawatts of electricity using gas from the adjacent Marcellus shale basin. The project will utilize infrastructure left on site from the old coal plan. GE Vernova will provide seven gas-fired turbines for the project, with first deliveries expected to begin next year. The smokestacks and cooling towers at Homer City were largely demolished two weeks ago. (Adds location of site in second paragraph, demolition of smokestacks in last paragraph.)