Looking for a quick fix for their fast-growing electricity diets, tech giants are increasingly looking to strike deals with power plant owners to plug in directly, avoiding a potentially longer and more expensive process of hooking into a fraying electric grid that serves everyone else.

The unit of Blackstone dedicated to investments in the energy industry has agreed to acquire Potomac Energy Center, the asset manager told Reuters on Thursday, in a deal symbolizing the allure to investors of power plants sited near data centers.

Amazon’s server farms in eastern Oregon are using much less fossil fuel to power their operations, new data shows, sharply reducing its carbon emissions after five years of steep increases. The shift is apparent in a new state report on the small electric utility that serves Amazon’s data centers in Morrow and Umatilla counties.

Artificial intelligence has become vital in business and financial dealings, medical care, technology development, research, and much more. Without realizing it, consumers rely on AI when they stream a video,

The report, based on a survey of 100 data center leaders, also shows that 30% of all sites will be using onsite power by 2030. For reference, McKinsey research estimates that there was 25 gigawatts worth of demand in 2024.