Gigawatt Ledger · one-page briefing
Campus profile Under construction
Stargate Abilene
Crusoe / Lancium (Oracle lease) · Abilene, Texas
The resource footprint
Modelled averageIn one day, this campus consumes about
1.8750-metre swimming pools
Filled with the volume of water consumed by the campus and its electricity supply.
The actual estimate1,232,085 US gallons consumed
Power-plant water may come from a different watershed. This is a volume comparison, not a claim that households lose this water.
At current operating capacity · Annual model spread evenly over time, not a live meter. Site estimates may differ by roughly ±40%.
Comparison sizes & sources
One pool = 50 × 25 × 2 metres = 2.5 million litres (about 660,430 US gallons). Pool depths vary; this is a defined comparison size.
One home-year = 10,791 kWh, the EIA’s 2022 average US residential electricity purchases. This excludes electricity generated at home and is a fixed US benchmark for all sites.
One car-year = 4.6 tonnes CO₂, the EPA’s typical passenger vehicle tailpipe estimate. The campus model is in CO₂e; the comparison expresses approximate climate scale, not equal mixtures of pollutants.
Monthly values are annual totals ÷ 12; daily values are annual totals ÷ 365. Actual demand varies. Comparisons cover the whole campus, including non-AI uses.
Water: see the numbers and sources
This is water used up, mainly through evaporation. Power-generation water may be used in a different watershed.
- Pressure on local water
- High — a regional measure of demand compared with available water
- Where the water comes from
- Municipal potable supply
- Cooling
- Closed-loop direct-to-chip liquid
- Basis
- Modelled from cooling design — WUE 0.09 L/kWh
- Claimed vs observed
- Claimed 0.10 million gallons a year; observed or registered 8.00 million.
Air: see the numbers and sources
The totals include nitrogen oxides, sulphur dioxide and fine particles. They cover both this site and the power plants supplying it.
- Health range
- $15.2–43.8 million a year. Lower bound is EASIUR national mid-range; upper is EPA benefit-per-ton at a ~$12M VSL.
- Statistical deaths
- 3.65 a year at that VSL — a national-average conversion from tons, not a local concentration study.
- Equals
- 645,064 cars of NOx
- Where it burns
- ERCOT — Texas + 30% turbines on the site itself
- Generation mix
- Gas 40 · Wind 24 · Solar 11 · Coal 13 · Nuclear 9
- Emitted at the fence line
- 39% of this site's criteria pollution
- Diesel backup
- 62 gensets, 35.4 MW standby. Test-hours term: 4.25 t NOx/yr (50 h at 30% load, 8 kg NOx/MWh).
- Turbines
- 10 permitted, permitted 8,760 hours a year
- CO₂e
- 848 kt/yr — climate, not air quality
The project, approvals and community concerns
- Who asked for it
- OpenAI — via a 15-year Oracle lease on the Lancium Clean Campus; developed by a Crusoe / Blue Owl / Primary Digital JV
- Who approved it
- Taylor County + City of Abilene tax abatements (Ch. 313/380 agreements); TCEQ Standard Permit 177263 for five 38 MW Titan 350 and five 34.1 MW GE LM2500 turbines (8,760 h/yr); ERCOT large-load interconnection
- What it serves
- Frontier model pre-training and inference for OpenAI
- IT capacity
- 250 MW current capacity / 1,200 MW full-build scenario
The flagship Stargate site: eight buildings on ~1,100 acres in the Abilene wind belt. Cooling is closed-loop, so on-site water draw is small — but roughly a third of its power comes from gas turbines permitted on the property itself.
Keep this guide handy
32.3776°, -99.6672°
Quote or share these estimates
Gigawatt Ledger (2026). Stargate Abilene: water and air. https://gigawatt-ledger.pages.dev/site/abilene/. Modelled from disclosed capacity; site-level error ±40%.
Include the estimate’s date, whether it describes current or proposed capacity, and its uncertainty. Get an embeddable card.
Gigawatt Ledger · September 2026. Water and air figures are estimated from public records and disclosed capacity. How we calculate them · Use this in your community.