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California Data Center Intel
Latest data center news, projects, power and policy across California — updated daily.
California · Construction & power moves · 1
full tracker →Land, power, and interconnection moves across California — each traced to primary filings.
Top JUST IN — California
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Large Loads Initiative: Additional discussion of operational and technical requirements, call on 8/24/26
Source: California ISO · Aug 17, 2026California ISO said it scheduled an additional stakeholder meeting for the Large Loads Initiative “to provide additional time, if needed, to discuss the operational and technical requirements” in the Large Loads Straw Proposal and Large Loads Technical Requirements Straw Proposal, with topics including “Operational requirements” and “Technical requirements” (California ISO, Aug. 17, 2026). The notice also says the Aug. 24 meeting was contingent and ultimately unnecessary because “We were able to cover all of the material and will no longer need the meeting on 8/24.”
Backed by 1 primary filing — sign in or book a call to see all sources.
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Large Loads Initiative: Straw proposal posted, meeting on 8/19/26
Source: California ISO · Aug 12, 2026California ISO says that, following the FERC “June 18, 2026, Order to Show Cause,” its Large Loads Initiative is the “primary forum” for possible “tariff, policy, and process enhancements” affecting large-load integration on the ISO-controlled grid, including “planning, interconnection, transmission service, reliability, and operational considerations.” CAISO also says the straw proposal will address “Cost Shifting Risk Among Transmission Customers,” “Co-Location Arrangements and Load with Behind the Meter Generation,” and “Interconnection Customers Serving Electrically Proximate Large Load and Co-Located Load.”
Backed by 1 primary filing — sign in or book a call to see all sources.
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2025 Draft Participating Transmission Owner Per Unit Cost Guides Posted
Source: California ISO · Apr 03, 2025CAISO said it “has posted the Draft Per Unit Cost Guides” and that “participating transmission owners update and publish per unit costs annually as part of the current interconnection study cycle for estimating the cost of facilities required to interconnect resources,” with written comments due by April 30, 2025, according to the California ISO notice.
Backed by 1 primary filing — sign in or book a call to see all sources.
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Large Loads Considerations: Comment deadline on information session moved to 2/25/26
Source: California ISO · Feb 12, 2026California ISO said it “has moved the deadline for written comments on the Large Load Considerations issue paper and Feb. 5 meeting discussion to Feb. 25, 2026,” and asked stakeholders to submit comments by end of day Feb. 25, 2026. The notice also says the “issue paper, presentation, and meeting recording are available” on CAISO’s Large Load webpage.
Backed by 1 primary filing — sign in or book a call to see all sources.
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PG&E Restricted Substations Clarifications
Source: CAISO · Nov 01, 2024CAISO’s notice on “PG&E Restricted Substations Clarifications” says PG&E will review interconnection requests during the “cluster application/resubmission window” to confirm the point of interconnection, and the California ISO will tell customers whether “The interconnection is acceptable” or “The interconnection is not acceptable” (CAISO, 2024-11-01). It also states that “Interconnections may not add new elements to the substations in Tables G2 and G2-A. Entry to the substations must be via existing facilities.”
Backed by 1 primary filing — sign in or book a call to see all sources.
Recent California data center news
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Could Fiber Be the Next Big Bottleneck in Data Center Growth?
This article is commentary and analysis about fiber connectivity as a data center infrastructure constraint, not a first-time announcement by a specific company.
- It argues that enterprise-grade fiber is becoming as important as power and water for data center growth, citing Zayo’s 2025 Bandwidth Report and noting data center bandwidth purchased grew about 330% in the early 2020s.
- It suggests operators prioritize fiber availability, map competitive demand, and use incentives with carriers; it also mentions AWS SiteLink and Azure ExpressRoute Global Reach as alternative connectivity options.
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India’s power needs are surging. So why is solar going to waste?
India is facing rising solar curtailment as demand surges and grid limits prevent all clean power from being used.
- The article says India curtailed nearly 11 terawatt-hours of solar generation in the last 15 months, even as heat and weak monsoon rains pushed up electricity demand; Neshwin Rodrigues of Ember said, “We’re in a stage where some of the biggest hurdles in renewables are starting to hit us.”
- It attributes the problem to insufficient transmission, storage, and grid flexibility, with Vibrant Energy CEO Vinay Pabba and Ingro Energy CEO Ankit Mittal warning that curtailment hurts developers and that storage is needed to avoid it; the piece also says India is targeting 500 GW of clean electricity capacity by 2030 and expects about 74 GW of storage needs by 2032.
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California Judge Orders Full Environmental Review of 330 MW Data Center
Imperial County Superior Court has tentatively ruled that Imperial County must set aside key approvals and complete a full CEQA environmental review before construction can proceed on Imperial Valley Computer Manufacturing, LLC’s proposed 330 MW data center.
- Judge L. Brooks Anderholt found the County improperly treated approvals as ministerial and relied on a 2017 environmental review that did not analyze the current project; the proposed remedy would require an Environmental Impact Report (EIR) before grading, construction, or other physical development.
- The project is described as a roughly 950,000-square-foot facility on about 75 acres southeast of Aten Road and Clark Road, with a 330 MW load, 330 MW substation, 862 MWh BESS, four 500,000-gallon water tanks, a six-acre retention basin, and 132 natural gas generators; it also requires transmission interconnections with the Imperial Irrigation District (IID).
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Ansaldo Returns to U.S. Gas Turbine Market as Equipment Crunch Widens Supplier Field
Ansaldo Energia has announced an order to supply Pacifico Energy with eight AE64.3A gas turbines and associated generators for a Texas data center power project.
- First equipment deliveries are scheduled for 2027; the eight units represent about 624 MW of nominal generating capacity based on the 78-MW simple-cycle rating.
- The article says the project supports major data center infrastructure and places Ansaldo back in the U.S. generation market after more than 30 years; Pacifico Energy has separately identified Texas projects including GW Ranch and Fort Spunky.
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US utility-scale battery energy storage capacity almost doubled during first 18 months of Trump’s second term
The Solar Energy Industries Association and Benchmark Mineral Intelligence have published the Q3 2026 US Energy Storage Market Outlook, reporting record US battery storage deployments in Q2 2026.
- The report says 6.7GW/20.2GWh of new battery energy storage systems came online between March and end-June 2026, with 17.9GWh in utility-scale projects and 56% of utility-scale capacity standalone.
- It also says Arizona, Texas and Utah accounted for much of the quarter’s growth, while the C&I segment benefited from the expansion of data centres and onsite power needs; SEIA and Benchmark also raised their 2030 forecast to 683GWh.
- The article references earlier announcements and policy developments, including Illinois’ 3GW by 2030 target, Virginia’s expanded 20GW-plus target, Nebraska’s framework for first BESS developments, and FERC show cause orders on large-load grid connections.
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Nvidia unveils alternative high bandwidth technology to bolster AI cards
Nvidia has announced NVHBM, a customized High Bandwidth Memory architecture for AI accelerators and custom XPUs.
- The company says NVHBM is part of its NVLink Fusion platform and is aimed at hyperscalers and AI companies building custom accelerators; Amazon’s Annapurna Labs is named as the first announced partner.
- Nvidia says the design moves the memory controller into the HBM stack’s base die, and claims up to 30% greater bandwidth, 15% lower power, and 25% more compute-die area versus conventional HBM4E.
- The article frames this as a blog-post announcement published alongside Nvidia’s quarterly earnings call, not as a report of a separate commercial deal.
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Nokia to Transform NXP’s Chandler Campus for AI-Era Optical Chips
Nokia has announced a definitive agreement to acquire NXP Semiconductors’ Chandler Fab and Chandler Probe site and repurpose it for AI infrastructure-related optical component manufacturing.
- Nokia will lease part of the facility in early 2027 and acquire the full campus in Q1 2029, subject to regulatory approval.
- The site will produce indium phosphide semiconductors for optical components used in high-speed networks linking processors, memory, and systems inside AI data centers.
- Nokia said its Optical Networks sales increased 20% YoY in Q2 and sales to AI and cloud customers increased 105%.
- NXP issued a discontinuation notice for legacy products made at Chandler that will not move to another manufacturing site, and said it does not expect near-term supply impact during the transition.
- Nokia is also preparing to ramp a new San Jose fab and expand advanced testing and packaging capacity in Pennsylvania tenfold.
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Solid-State Transformers Power Next-Gen AI Data Centers
The article explains the emerging role of solid-state transformers in high-voltage direct current power architectures for AI data centers, while citing industry views and ongoing pilots rather than announcing a single new commercial deal.
- Delta says its SST platform converts MV AC (6.6-35 kV) directly to 800 V DC at up to 98.5% efficiency; it was developed with Open Compute Project efforts and Nvidia’s 800 V DC specification and was demoed at the OCP Summit 2025.
- Alderbuck Energy is piloting its technology at the San Diego Supercomputer Center at UC San Diego; Rick Sander said he expects most new installations to use SSTs by 2028 and most data centers to rely exclusively on SSTs by 2035. The article also presents cautionary views from SPOC Energy and Hitachi Energy on maturity and supply-chain readiness.
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United States and Cameroon Announce $7 Billion in Investment and Trade Opportunities at Inaugural Economic and Commercial Dialogue
The United States and Cameroon have announced approximately $7 billion in new and expanding investment and trade opportunities during the inaugural U.S.-Cameroon Bilateral Economic and Commercial Dialogue.
- The announcement covers sectors including technology, critical minerals, infrastructure, energy, forestry, and logistics, and the two sides agreed to establish joint working groups and continue the Dialogue ahead of the next meeting in 2027, which the United States will host.
- Specific projects mentioned include Tronox/Lion Rock‘s $500 million rutile project, ARM‘s planned $85 million cobalt-nickel-manganese project in Nkamouna, Hydromine‘s proposed $3.5 billion, 1,040-MW Grand Eweng Hydropower Project, and Cybastion‘s $75 million AI-powered data center and power plant in Douala.
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AI Rack Density’s Real Limits: Power, Cooling, Failure Risk
The article analyzes how AI is pushing data center rack density higher and argues that cooling, power delivery, and grid access now set the main limits on AI rack design.
- It cites Uptime Institute data showing modal rack density rose to 11 kW in 2026 from 9 kW in 2025, while Nvidia GB300 NVL72 reaches up to 142 kW per rack and Rubin Ultra NVL576 “Kyber” is specified at roughly 600 kW for H2 2027.
- It says direct-to-chip liquid cooling now handles 100-150 kW per rack and is the dominant liquid method; 800 VDC is shipping with Vera Rubin NVL72, and vendors including Vertiv, Schneider Electric, Eaton, and Delta have commercial 800 VDC offerings slated for H2 2026. It also references Foxconn’s 40 MW Kaohsiung-1 facility in Taiwan, the Open Compute Project Mount Diablo specification finalized in March 2026, and Microsoft/Meta hardware demonstrations in July 2026.