Big Tech Data Centers: Meta's Massive Nuclear Power Deals, $20B by xAI in Mississippi

Jan 9, 2026 (AP) – Social media giant Meta on Friday announced it had cut a trio of deals to power its artificial intelligence data centers, less than one day after Elon Musk's artificial intelligence company xAI announced being set to spend $20 billion to build a data center in Southaven, Mississippi.

In Mississippi, Gov. Tate Reeves announced the xAI deal on Thursday, calling it the largest private investment in the state's history.

Meta’s energy deals constitute enough power to light up the equivalent of about 5 million homes.

Meta’s deals with TerraPower, Oklo and Vistra

The parent company of Facebook announced agreements with TerraPower, Oklo and Vistra for nuclear power for its Prometheus AI data center that is being built in New Albany, Ohio. 

Meta announced Prometheus, which will be a 1-gigawatt cluster spanning across multiple data center buildings, in July. It's anticipated to come online this year.

Financial terms of the deals with TerraPower, Oklo and Vistra were not disclosed.

The Mark Zuckerberg-led Meta said in a statement on Friday that the three deals will support up to 6.6 gigawatts of new and existing clean energy by 2035. A single gigawatt, according to a general industry standard for utilities, can power about 750,000 homes.

“These projects add reliable and firm power to the grid, reinforce America’s nuclear supply chain, and support new and existing jobs to build and operate American power plants,” the company said.

Meta said its agreement with TerraPower will provide funding that supports the development of two new Natrium units capable of generating up to 690 megawatts of firm power with delivery as early as 2032. The deal also provides Meta with rights for energy from up to six other Natrium units capable of producing 2.1 gigawatts and targeted for delivery by 2035.

Meta will also buy more than 2.1 gigawatts of energy from two operating Vistra nuclear power plants in Ohio, in addition to the energy from expansions at the two Ohio plants and a third Vistra plant in Pennsylvania.

The deal with Oklo, which counts OpenAI's Sam Altman as one of its largest investors, will help to develop a 1.2 gigawatt power campus in Pike County, Ohio to support Meta’s data centers in the region.

The nuclear power agreements come after Meta announced in June that it reached a 20-year deal with Constellation Energy.

xAI’s $20 billion data center in Mississippi

The xAI data center in Mississippi, called MACROHARDRR, is being built in Mississippi’s DeSoto County near Memphis, Tennessee. It will be the company’s third data center in the greater Memphis area. xAI CFO Anthony Armstrong said the cluster of data centers will house “the world's largest supercomputer" with 2 gigawatts of computing power.

The announcement comes as xAI faces scrutiny over its data center projects in the Memphis area. The NAACP and the Southern Environmental Law Center have raised concerns over air pollution generated by xAI's supercomputer facility located near predominantly Black communities in Memphis.

A petition by the Safe and Sound Coalition, a Southaven group opposing xAI's developments, calls for shutting down xAI's operations in the area and has received more than 900 signatures as of Thursday afternoon.

xAI did not immediately respond when asked for comment about environmental concerns.

A fact sheet released by the Mississippi governor's office said environmental responsibility is a “core commitment” for xAI.

During the announcement, Reeves personally thanked Musk. Reeves predicted the investment would bring hundreds of permanent jobs to the community, thousands of indirect subcontracting jobs, and tax revenue to support public services.

Under the incentives for data centers passed in 2024, the state will waive all sales, corporate income and franchise taxes on the xAI development. Saving sales taxes on the computing power that xAI is purchasing would likely be worth a substantial amount of money, but the Mississippi Development Authority did not immediately respond to The Associated Press' questions about how much tax revenue Mississippi will give up.

DeSoto County and the city of Southaven have also agreed to allow substantially reduced property taxes.

xAI is expected to begin data center operations in Southaven next month.

This article is a combination of two Associated Press articles: One about Meta written by Michelle Chapman and one about xAI written by Sophie Bates.