Amazon has acquired land and air permits in Pecos County, Texas, for an AI data center powered by a 7.65-gigawatt natural gas plant, the New York Times reported Friday.
The state air permit allows the plant to emit 33 million tons of carbon dioxide per year, which would make it the single largest source of greenhouse gas pollution in the country, exceeding every operating U.S. coal plant, TechCrunch reported.
The facility would use 35 natural gas turbines and would not connect to the Texas power grid, at least initially. Amazon said the plant "won't raise electricity costs for Texas families" and that it is "exploring opportunities" for on-site solar and battery storage.
Amazon's total carbon emissions rose 16% last year. The company said "the world looks different now than when we co-founded the Climate Pledge" but maintained its 2040 net-zero commitment.
For startups building on cloud infrastructure, the permit numbers put a concrete figure on the environmental cost of compute at scale.