OpenAI Eyes 16 States For Massive Data Centers Tied To Trump's Stargate AI Project

OpenAI revealed that it is considering 16 states for building data center campuses related to President Donald Trump's Stargate AI project.

After taking office, Trump introduced Stargate, a partnership between OpenAI, Oracle, and SoftBank, to strengthen the U.S. artificial intelligence infrastructure. The project's key technology partners include Microsoft, Nvidia, Oracle, and semiconductor company Arm.

The companies plan to invest $100 billion initially and up to $500 billion over the next four years. Construction has already started on data centers in Abilene, Texas. OpenAI plans to build more data centers in states like Arizona, California, Florida, Louisiana, Maryland, Nevada, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Utah, Texas, Virginia, Washington, Wisconsin, and West Virginia.

The Artificial intelligence (AI) company executives told reporters on Thursday that OpenAI sent a request for proposals (RFP) to these states less than a week ago.

"A project of this size represents an opportunity to both re-industrialize parts of the country, but also to help revitalize where the American Dream is going to go in this intelligence age," OpenAI's vice president of global policy Chris Lehane said, NBC News reported.

The company aims to build between five and 10 data center campuses, but the final number may change based on the power capacity of each site. Each data center campus is expected to use about one gigawatt of power or more.

The company also expects each data center to create thousands of jobs, including roles in construction and operations. However, reports suggest that the first Stargate data center in Abilene may initially generate only 57 jobs.

Massive data centers have become a topic of debate in recent years due to their high environmental impact. These facilities use up to 50 times more energy per square foot than a typical office building, according to Energy.gov.

Google reported in 2022 that its data centers used an average of 450,000 gallons of water per day for cooling. Some of its facilities were estimated to consume between one and four million gallons of water daily, according to Time.

However, the race to advance artificial intelligence in the United States is intensifying as China rapidly develops its own AI technology, DeepSeek, which gained attention after its app quickly became the most downloaded on Apple's App Store.