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IL · State profile
Illinois Data Center Intel
Latest data center news, projects, power and policy across Illinois — updated daily.
Recent Illinois data center news
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Accelerating Science with Digital Twins
Berkeley Lab is advancing and deploying AI-powered digital twins across multiple scientific instruments and domains.
- Main announcement / action: Berkeley Lab is developing and installing AI-driven digital twins for particle accelerators, tsunami forecasting, chemistry and materials discovery, building energy systems, fusion plasma, and biological bioreactor scale-up—leveraging DOE facilities such as NERSC (Perlmutter), ESnet networking, and DOE programs including LDRD and the Genesis initiatives; projects include the StFT AI model, the BELLA beamline digital twin, DTCS for chemistry, and a biological twin for lipid production for jet fuel.
- Background and implementation details: Funding and support come from DOE offices and programs (LDRD, DOE Office of Electricity, Advanced Fuels and Feedstocks Office, Genesis/AmSC); work uses high-performance computing (Perlmutter, Polaris) and low-jitter ESnet circuits (OSCARS) to enable real-time data flows; the tsunami digital twin used NERSC and won the 2025 ACM Gordon Bell Prize, and accelerator efforts plan to standardize APIs and deploy across facilities under the Genesis Mission framework.
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Crunching Big Data Into 3D Images Accelerates Discovery
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (NERSC) and the Advanced Light Source (ALS) announced deployment of a Superfacility real-time data streaming pipeline connecting ALS Beamline 8.3.2 to NERSC via ESnet, enabling near-instant 3D micro-CT reconstructions during experiments.
- Main announcement/action: The project implements real-time streaming from ALS to NERSC (via ESnet) so micro-CT datasets (often 50 GB+) are reconstructed on NERSC using multiple high-powered GPUs with results available in less than 10 seconds; this capability is the result of a two-year collaborative project involving 30+ contributors and is now in daily production use. The pipeline was developed through NERSC’s NESAP program and integrated by ALS Beamline Controls, Photon Science Computing, and Berkeley Lab IT.
- Background and details: The effort built on shared code from APS/Argonne, included updates to beamline data-acquisition software/hardware, and was first demonstrated in production with the Saad Bhamla Lab (Georgia Tech). The team plans to expand the framework to support ptychographic imaging and to combine the pipeline with AI/ML tools for automated image segmentation and analysis.
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Can high-temperature superconductors transform the power infrastructure of datacenters?
Microsoft is investigating high-temperature superconductors (HTS) to understand how its datacenters can meet rising AI-driven power demand and improve operational sustainability.
- Primary announcement: Microsoft is exploring and testing HTS technologies (including a factory test of a 3MW superconducting cable and a world’s first HTS-powered rack prototype) to increase power density, reduce transmission losses, and support AI-era workloads. Microsoft is working with technology partners and system integrators such as VEIR (a Microsoft Climate Innovation Fund portfolio company) and referencing industry examples from AMSC/ComEd.
- Background and implementation details: HTS can deliver an order of magnitude higher capacity at the same voltage and smaller physical footprint, enabling denser rack power delivery and reduced community impact; Microsoft shared its vision at OCP 2025 and highlights integration with cooling (cryogenics), networking (hollow-core fiber), and microfluidics projects for deployment.
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Dynamic Load Model for Data Centers with Pattern-Consistent Calibration
Siyu Lu and co-authors have posted a paper to arXiv presenting a new dynamic load model for data centers with pattern-consistent calibration (submitted 8 Feb 2026).
- Main announcement: The paper proposes a physics-based parameterized load model for large electronic loads (LELs) combined with pattern-consistent calibration using temporal contrastive learning (TCL); the model is calibrated locally at facilities (privacy-preserving: only calibrated parameters are shared with utilities) and validated on operational datasets MIT Supercloud, ASU Sol, Blue Waters, and ASHRAE and integrated into the ANDES platform for grid tests.
- Background and evaluation details: The calibrated model was integrated into ANDES and evaluated on transmission test systems IEEE 39-bus, NPCC 140-bus, and WECC 179-bus; authors report that interactions among LELs alter post-disturbance recovery, producing compound disconnection-reconnection dynamics and delayed stabilization. The paper is available on arXiv (DOI via DataCite pending).
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Virginia Data Center Reform Coalition in Richmond February 9th to Advocate for Meaningful Data Center Legislation
The Virginia Data Center Reform Coalition announced a Lobby Day on Feb. 9, 2026 in Richmond to advocate for data center reform legislation.
- Lobby Day details: Coalition kickoff on Feb. 9, 2026 at 8 a.m. at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church (815 East Grace Street, Richmond); nearly 200 Virginians expected to travel to Richmond to meet with legislators; media invited to RSVP to Mike Doble (mdoble@pecva.org). Several bills may face floor action on Feb. 9, including HB155/SB619, HB284/SB371, HB507, HB496, HB589/SB553, HB658/SB339, HB897/SB465.
- Coalition priorities & background: The Coalition supports four pillars—state oversight, enhanced transparency, ratepayer protections, and tax incentive reform—and represents 50+ organizations (e.g., CCAN Action Fund, Piedmont Environmental Council, National Parks Conservation Association, Clean Virginia, Nature Forward, Potomac Conservancy). The release cites an ICPRB-related projection that data centers could use 33% of the Potomac Basin’s water (per Ken Wright).
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Top 20 countries by the number of data centers in 2025
DevelopmentAid publishes an overview of the global data center market, trends, and investment forecasts.
- Main summary: The article provides a market overview noting the United States leads with 4,165 data centers (about 3,000 more being built/planned) and estimates the sector could reach US$22.7 billion by 2030 driven by generative AI, cloud services, 5G, and IoT. It cites major investment figures including Google >€5.5 billion (US$6.37 billion) in Germany and a €1 billion project involving Nvidia and Deutsche Telekom.
- Background & details: The piece aggregates third-party reports and data (Statista, Axios, McKinsey, JLL, Datum, Baxtel, Global Data Center Hub) and provides regional details: McKinsey’s US$6.7 trillion capex by 2030 (US$5.2 trillion for AI-optimized facilities, US$1.5 trillion for typical IT), Latin America growth from ~US$5bn (2023) to >US$10bn by 2029, and capacity/footprint statistics for countries and hyperscale operators. It is an informational market overview, not a primary announcement of a single new project with implementation timelines.
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Does solar really need subsidies? How successful renewable energy projects are adapting in 2026
Xendee has published survey-based research and hosted a Factor This panel/webcast summarizing how renewable microgrid projects are adapting in 2026.
- Main finding: Xendee surveyed more than 150 industry experts and identified securing funding and utility interconnection as the top challenges for microgrid developers; the article cites a Lawrence Berkeley National Lab finding that interconnection times can reach up to eight years.
- Panel insights & context: Panelists Dr. Michael Stadler (Xendee), Jon La Follett (Mayfield Renewables), and Wissam Balshe (Novitium Energy) emphasized design optimization and credible tools for project bankability; they noted solar-plus-batteries remains cost-competitive even after the ITC expiration and is a practical alternative for developers unable to procure or wait for gas turbines. Webinar is available on-demand (registration link included in document_urls).
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What we’re reading: Polar vortex incoming
Planet Detroit compiled a news roundup summarizing multiple environmental and infrastructure stories in Michigan and across the United States.
- Major items summarized:stretched polar vortex impacting 230 million Americans starting Friday with frigid weather into late Jan/early Feb; Michigan AG Dana Nessel seeks to block $7 million of DTE‘s $574 million rate-hike request; Great Lakes Water Authority proposes 6.83% water and 5.98% sewer rate increases affecting 112 communities across 8 southeast Michigan counties; Consumers Energy proposes a $70 million, 45-MW battery storage project on the former Weadock coal plant site (5 of 74 acres, 36 lithium iron phosphate batteries, intended to support grid reliability for 30 years).
- Additional factual details and background: Data shows 25 data center projects canceled in 2025 (about 4.7 GW of potential demand); an April oil/brine spill in Pigeon River Country State Forest totaled 221 barrels; Consumers Energy spent $164 million operating the Campbell plant under DOE emergency orders and recorded an $80 million loss; Detroit reported 51 broken water mains (Sterling Heights: 115 homes lost service); sources cited include PBS, mlive, The Detroit News, CBS, Detroit Free Press, Journal Sentinel, Utility Dive, and Gizmodo.
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Scientists empower an AI foundation model to accelerate plant research
Oak Ridge National Laboratory has developed D-CHAG, a new method that more than doubles processing speed and reduces memory usage by up to 75% for hyperspectral plant imaging, enabling training of larger AI foundation models on the Frontier exascale supercomputer.
- Main announcement: ORNL researchers introduced Distributed Cross-Channel Hierarchical Aggregation (D-CHAG), which uses distributed tokenization across GPUs and hierarchical aggregation to split and merge spectral channels; demonstrated >2x processing speed and up to 75% memory reduction on APPL hyperspectral data and a weather dataset, enabling training of larger foundation models without loss of spatial or spectral resolution. Presented at SC25 (Nov 2025) and run on Frontier at the Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility.
- Background and details: The work supports DOE’s Genesis Mission and DOE-supported projects including OPAL and a Generative Pretrained Transformer for Genomic Photosynthesis; collaborators and supporters include the Center for Bioenergy Innovation, ORNL laboratory-directed research & development funding, and partner institutions such as Argonne, Lawrence Berkeley, PNNL, and RIKEN; next steps include refining models to predict photosynthetic efficiency directly from hyperspectral images.
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Vanderbilt Report Argues for 'Dig Once' Policies to Reduce Fiber Instillation Costs
Vanderbilt Policy Accelerator released a report in December recommending strong “dig once” laws to require installation of conduit during any roadway excavation, shifting conduit installation responsibility toward governments to reduce costs and speed fiber deployment.
- Main recommendation: Require strong “dig once” laws for federally funded road construction so governments install conduit whenever roads are built or repaired; the report cites studies finding 75% to 90% of fiber deployment costs stem from digging up and repairing roadways (Fiber Broadband Association 2024; FHWA 2012).
- Context and details: The report notes federal legislative attempts were weakened into notification requirements (states notify ISPs when construction occurs); highlights state examples such as Utah (62.5% fiber coverage vs national average 49%) and other states with laws (California, Washington, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa); it references June 2026 BEAD revisions and urges Congress, during 2026 surface transportation reauthorization, to mandate dig once on federally funded projects.