02/02/2025 What I Read Last Week
#DigitalInfrastructure news: Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Amazon, DataBank, Power, the Grid
Weekly Edition of curated news about Digital Infrastructure
[Link] The Cedar Rapids City Council has approved two major data center projects: a $576 million Google data center, and a $750 million Quality Technology Services (QTS) data center.
[Link] Amazon is expected to spend 60% more than previously announced on its Mississippi data center project; looking to spend $16 billion to construct two data center campuses north of the state capital in Jackson.
[Link] DataBank announced a $250M equity investment from TJC LP and a $600 million secondary share offering, with DigitalBridge participating. The new funding resulted from excess investor interest in the $2B primary equity round announced in October 2024 and brings the total debt and equity raised in the past year and a half to nearly $5 billion.
[Link] The 2025 Submarine Cable Map is out! The new high-contrast design depicts 597 cable systems and 1,712 landings currently active or under construction. I might order a physical copy of the map this year.
The topic of power and the U.S. Grid kept coming up in my news feeds this week:
[Link] I really enjoyed this article in InterGlobix by the one and only Christian Belady: A strategic view of harnessing AI for large loads on the grid. Power caching is analogous to data caching, where: frequently used "power" is stored locally, generation is placed near consumption to minimize grid strain, and the goal is to neutralize the impact of large data center loads on the electrical grid.
Research for next week: GridCare.ai
[Link] A new report from Grid Strategies called Strategic Industries Surging: Driving US Power Demand. Over the past two years, the 5-year load growth forecast has increased by almost a factor of five, from 23 GW to 128 GW, including Grid Strategies’ estimate of recent update reports. Industry specialists estimate five-year data center demand growth from as little as 10 GW to as much as 65 GW through 2029. While only some utilities break out data centers from other large load drivers, aggregate utility data center load forecasts may exceed 90 GW.
[Link] AI’s power gridlock: a review from Enchanted Rock about recent reports by the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) and the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) that have helped shed light on the challenges and propose strategies to meet the growing demand for power.
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