Pennsylvania
DataCentersExposed tracks 108 AI data centers in Pennsylvania — 21 operating and 47 in the pipeline — across 31 counties, drawing 23.8 GW of reported power demand from 13 tracked corporate operators.
Sources: Methodology, Coverage scorecard
Reporting by Eric Keller · Updated May 29, 2026
Pennsylvania at a glance
The largest footprint in Pennsylvania belongs to TierPoint, LLC, behind 5 tracked facilities. Amazon.com, Inc., Flexential Corp., and H5 Data Centers round out the most active operators in the state. Many of these sites are filed under shell or project names rather than the parent's — our operator column resolves them back to the real corporate parent wherever the chain is documented.
Geographically, the buildout clusters: Montgomery County leads Pennsylvania with 9 facilities and a composite risk score of 8/100. Luzerne County and Allegheny County follow. Our county risk score weights project exposure (40%), power demand (30%), water draw (15%), and land footprint (15%); the full breakdown is shown on each county page.
Pennsylvania is not done growing. 47 facilities are in the pipeline — proposed, permitted, or under construction — which is where residents still have a say at zoning hearings and in rate cases. Each pending project is a decision about land, water, electricity prices, and tax revenue that hasn't been finalized.
We also surface the accountability trail: 8 state bills mentioning data centers and 6 recent news items are tracked for Pennsylvania below, pulled from LegiScan and GDELT and refreshed automatically. Legislation is linked to the counties and operators it names; news is classified by community sentiment.
2035 Buildout Outlook
Under the model's moderate-growth scenario (5%/yr annual load growth), PNNL's IM3 model sites about 10 standardized 36 MW campuses in Pennsylvania by 2035 — roughly 360 MW of new electricity demand and ~348 M gal/yr of cooling water. Under the higher-growth scenario (15%/yr) that climbs to 56 campuses (2.0 GW). For scale, we currently track 108 real data centers in Pennsylvania (23.8 GW of reported power).
- Low growth7252 MW · ~244 M gal/yr cooling water
- Moderate growth10360 MW · ~348 M gal/yr cooling water
- High growth281.0 GW · ~975 M gal/yr cooling water
- Higher growth562.0 GW · ~1.9 billion gal/yr cooling water
The model assigns ~100% of these campuses' cooling to evaporative water cooling in Pennsylvania (the rest to mechanical/air cooling), a split it derives from local water stress and wet-bulb temperature.
These are modeled candidate sites, not announced or permitted facilities. PNNL's IM3 model places identical 36 MW unit-campuses at feasible locations under each scenario — it shows where demand could concentrate, never a specific parcel. Figures use a market-gravity weight of 50. How the model works.
Top operators in Pennsylvania
County risk leaderboard
| County | Facilities | Pipeline | Risk |
|---|---|---|---|
| Montgomery County | 9 | 1 | 8 |
| Luzerne County | 6 | 3 | 7 |
| Allegheny County | 7 | 2 | 6 |
| Lehigh County | 4 | 1 | 6 |
| Philadelphia County | 4 | — | 4 |
| Lackawanna County | 13 | 10 | — |
| Beaver County | 4 | 3 | — |
| Chester County | 4 | 3 | — |
| Carbon County | 3 | 2 | — |
| York County | 3 | 3 | — |
| Lycoming County | 2 | 2 | — |
| Dauphin County | 2 | 2 | — |
Pipeline & proposals
- Proposed1.5 GWProject Gold Data CenterOperator unknown · Lackawanna County
- Proposed828 MWEnergy Capital PartnersCalpine (Energy Capital Parners) · York County
- Proposed750 MWProject LaurelMCD 7 LLC · Montgomery County
- Proposed600 MWBreaker Street Associates LLC Data CenterBreaker Street Associates LLC · Lackawanna County
- Proposed500 MWZediker Station Data CenterCNX Resources/Jones Lang LaSalle (JLL) · Washington County
- Proposed248 MWWyalusing Data CenterAmerican Tower Corporation · Bradford County