Tennessee
DataCentersExposed tracks 36 AI data centers in Tennessee — 5 operating and 6 in the pipeline — across 10 counties, drawing 1.2 GW of reported power demand from 11 tracked corporate operators.
Sources: Methodology, Coverage scorecard
Reporting by Eric Keller · Updated May 29, 2026
Tennessee at a glance
The largest footprint in Tennessee belongs to Flexential Corp., behind 4 tracked facilities. Alphabet Inc., Lumen Technologies, and Meta Platforms, Inc. 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: Williamson County leads Tennessee with 5 facilities and a composite risk score of 9/100. Montgomery County and Davidson 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.
Tennessee is not done growing. 6 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 Tennessee 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 3 standardized 36 MW campuses in Tennessee by 2035 — roughly 108 MW of new electricity demand and ~104 M gal/yr of cooling water. Under the higher-growth scenario (15%/yr) that climbs to 16 campuses (576 MW). For scale, we currently track 36 real data centers in Tennessee (1.2 GW of reported power).
- Low growth272 MW · ~70 M gal/yr cooling water
- Moderate growth3108 MW · ~104 M gal/yr cooling water
- High growth8288 MW · ~279 M gal/yr cooling water
- Higher growth16576 MW · ~557 M gal/yr cooling water
The model assigns ~100% of these campuses' cooling to evaporative water cooling in Tennessee (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 Tennessee
County risk leaderboard
| County | Facilities | Pipeline | Risk |
|---|---|---|---|
| Williamson County | 5 | — | 9 |
| Montgomery County | 4 | — | 9 |
| Davidson County | 8 | 4 | 8 |
| Sumner County | 4 | — | 8 |
| Shelby County | 3 | — | 6 |
| Hamilton County | 2 | 1 | 4 |
| Roane County | 1 | — | 4 |
| Henry County | 1 | — | 4 |
| Rutherford County | 1 | — | 4 |
| Coffee County | 1 | 1 | — |
Pipeline & proposals
- Proposed50 MWDC BLOX Nashville (Grassmere Park)DC BLOX · Davidson County
- Proposed30 MWQuantum Leap Data Center/ Fisk UniversityOperator unknown · Davidson County
- ProposedArnold Air Force Base Data CenterOperator unknown · Coffee County
- ProposedDC Blox Data CenterOperator unknown · Davidson County
- ProposedFisk University Data CenterOperator unknown · Davidson County
- Under constructionJailhouse Studios Data CenterOperator unknown · Hamilton County