600+ acres near Houston, Texas, will give AI leaders the space and power needed for the next wave of innovation with zero emissions
ECL has announced it will build one of the first fully sustainable 1GW AI Factory data centres – ECL TerraSite-TX1 – on a 600+ acre site east of Houston.
The initial phase of TerraSite-TX1 will be delivered in the summer of 2025 at approximately US$450 million, with 50MW of data centre capacity to be utilised by data centre cloud and AI cloud operators.
The entire 1GW site will be constructed at approximately US$8 billion, with funding to be provided by ECL and financial partners.
“The data centre technology committed to by ECL is truly transformative in the industry,” said Ken Patchett, VP Data Center Infrastructure, Lambda. “We believe ECL’s technology could unlock a powerful and eco-conscious foundation for AI advancement. This new infrastructure could give researchers and developers essential computational resources while drastically reducing the environmental impact of AI operations.”
ECL has made strides in addressing critical challenges in the data centre industry, as exemplified by the launch of ECL-MV1 – now in full production – one of the world’s first off-grid, hydrogen-powered modular data centres that operates 24/7 with zero emissions, minimal noise and a negative water footprint, replenishing water to the community.
It offers a 10x increase in energy efficiency with a Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) of 1.05 and a 7x improvement in data density per rack, ideal for AI high-density demands.
Gartner predicts that by 2030, AI could consume up to 3.5% of the world’s electricity. “AI consumes a lot of electricity and water. This negative impact should be mitigated,” said Pieter den Hamer, VP Analyst at Gartner. “Executives should be cognizant of AI’s own growing environmental footprint and take active mitigation measures. For example, they could prioritise (cloud) data centres powered by renewable energy”.
Designed specifically for the development and deployment of AI technologies, the site will also provide space for tenants’ AI experts, researchers, data scientists and engineers to collaborate to create cutting-edge AI solutions.
Hydrogen will be provided by three separate pipelines that converge at the site, eliminating the need for additional fuel transportation. The initial 1GW phased development may be expanded to 2GW in the future, enabled by its modularity and based on customer demand.
ECL provides one of the data centre industry’s lowest total cost of ownership (TCO) and the fastest time-to-market, along with unmatched flexibility in location, size and density.
ECL data centres are modular, allowing for easy expansion in 1MW increments, and are built to suit and delivered in less than 12 months, versus the industry standard of 36 to 48. By eliminating the environmental impact associated with traditional data centre development and utilisation, it also gives AI consumers – both corporate and individual – assurance that its use of AI is not expanding their carbon footprints.
ECL’s AI infrastructure is enhanced by its advanced AI data centre management system, ECL Lightning, which offers real-time monitoring and micro adjustments control over every aspect of data centre operations, from power generation to rack cooling. Its user-friendly interface provides comprehensive visibility and configuration capabilities, ensuring optimal performance for AI and other workloads.
ECL’s proprietary cooling innovations include using water from hydrogen-based power generation, along with patent-pending quadruple loop and direct-to-chip cooling technologies for its extremely high-density racks.
ECL Terrasite-TX1 comes at a critical time for the state of Texas, with The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) testifying on 12 June 2024, that the state’s power grid needs will grow approximately 2x by 2030, due in part to the growth of data centres and AI.
ECL Terrasite-TX1 is purpose-built to reduce the increased strain on the state’s power grid while facilitating the growth of the AI industry.
“While others talk about delivering off-grid, hydrogen-powered data centres in five, 10, or 20 years, only ECL is giving the AI industry the space, power and peace of mind they and their customers need, now,” said Yuval Bachar, Co-founder and CEO of ECL. “The level of innovation that we have introduced to the market is unprecedented and will serve not only us and our customers but the entire data centre industry for decades to come.”
