SpaceX Removing Gas Turbines from Mississippi Data Center
The decision comes amid ongoing lawsuits and a top House Democrat letter to SpaceX CEO Elon Musk.
WASHINGTON, August 3, 2026 – SpaceXAI is removing 69 gas-powered turbines from data center facilities’ power plants in Southhaven, Miss., as the company faces pushback from a high-ranking House Democrat.
In a July 30 statement, SpaceXAI said, “We have entered into an agreed order with the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality establishing a fixed removal timeline for all 69 of the temporary, mobile turbines that currently power our facility in Southhaven, Mississippi.”
The company will keep 41 permanent turbines, noting that it is investing in equipping mobile turbines with advanced emission control technologies that safely convert nitrous oxide into nitrogen and water to improve air quality.
This comes as Rep. Frank Pallone Jr., D-N.J., wrote a letter on July 28 to SpaceXAI CEO Elon Musk, warning that the company’s data centers in Tennessee and Mississippi, Colossus 1 and Colossus 2, pose serious risks to communities.
“What has also become apparent from my examination of data centers is your company’s disregard for the health and well-being of local communities,” Pallone said in the letter. He requested Musk provide information regarding the facilities’ turbines and power consumption and asked to tour the facilities.
Violation of the Clean Air Act?
The Democrat said that the company’s rapid rollout of gas-powered turbines and off-grid gas turbines poses massive health risks to nearby communities, saying the turbines violate the Clean Air Act. He said the company only applied for 15 turbine permits despite the company operating 60 of them to power the Colossus 2.
In the letter, Pallone pointed to research showing Colossus 2 turbines can pump out roughly 5,000 tons of nitrogen oxide, 7,000 tons of carbon monoxide, 200 tons of sulfur dioxide and over 40 tons of formaldehyde. Hundreds of tons of volatile organic compounds and particulate matter are also emitted, making Colossus 2 the “largest source of pollution” in the area.
In February, the Environmental Law Center and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People filed a lawsuit, claiming that the turbines violated the Clean Air Act and were installed without proper permits, creating pollution that damaged the air quality in some of Memphis’ poorest neighborhoods.
Issue of noise pollution, too
Residents in Southhaven, Miss, are also suing SpaceXAI over the "inescapable and pervasive” noise created by the Colossus data centers and surrounding facilities.
Amid the controversy, the company is preparing to construct a fourth data center on the site. According to Data Center Dynamics, in March, the company applied for a building permit for a four-story, 312,000 square foot facility that cost $659 million, but its use had not been confirmed at the time.
Earlier this year during the company’s IPO prospectus, parent company SpaceX stated, “The next phase of expansion at Colossus 2 will bring online at least 220,000 additional GB300 processors and over 400 additional megawatts of compute power.” The company was likely referring to the new data center facility in Memphis.
Musk responded to an X user who posted drone footage of the new facility under construction at the Memphis data center complex. In a July 29 X post, the SpaceX CEO said, “To the right is Minihard, which will have the same 220k GB300s with 800gig NICs as Macroharder, but in an improved, much denser configuration.”
Musk nicknamed the Colossus data centers Macrohard and Macroharder, an apparent dig at Microsoft.
In May, SpaceXAI entered into a partnership with Anthropic, providing the artificial intelligence company access to 300 megawatts of computing capacity through the Colossus 1 facility.
