OpenAI is scouring the U.S. for websites to build a network of substantial information centers to power its artificial intelligence technology, broadening beyond a flagship Texas place and looking across 16 states to speed up the Stargate task championed by President Donald Trump.

The maker of ChatGPT put out an ask for for land, electrical power, engineers and bybio.co designers and began visiting places in Oregon, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin this week.

Trump promoted Stargate, a recently formed joint endeavor between OpenAI, Oracle and Softbank, quickly after going back to the White House last month.

The partnership said it is investing $100 billion - and eventually as much as $500 billion - to build large-scale information centers and the energy generation needed to further AI development. Trump called the job a “definite declaration of self-confidence in America ´ s potential” under his new administration, though the very first project in Abilene, Texas, has been under building and construction for months.

Elon Musk, a Trump consultant and intense rival of OpenAI who remains in a legal fight with the business and its CEO Sam Altman, has openly questioned the worth of Stargate’s financial investments.

After Trump’s announcement, a variety of states reached out to OpenAI about inviting extra information centers, Chris Lehane, OpenAI’s vice president of international affairs, told press reporters Thursday.

The business’s request for propositions calls for websites with “proximity to necessary infrastructure including power and water.”

AI uses vast amounts of energy, much of which comes from burning fossil fuels, which causes environment modification. Data centers likewise normally attract big quantities of water for cooling. Some tech giants have actually begun financing nuclear power to plug into their data centers.

OpenAI’s proposition makes no mention of whether it plans to prioritize sustainable energy sources such as wind or solar to power the information centers. But it states electrical power providers must have a plan to manage carbon emissions and water usage.

“There ´ s some websites we ´ re taking a look at where we want to assist become part of the process that brings brand-new power to that site, either from brand-new gas release or other ways,” said Keith Heyde, who directs OpenAI ´ s facilities strategy.

The first Texas project remains in an area Abilene Mayor Weldon Hurt has actually explained to The Associated Press as abundant in multiple energy sources, consisting of wind, solar and gas. Also explaining it that method is the company that began building the AI data center campus there in June - the exact same two “huge, beautiful buildings” that Altman flaunted in a current drone video posted on social media.

Crusoe CEO Chase Lochmiller said that wind power is main to the job his business is developing, though it will also have a gas-fired generator for backup power.

“We try to build information centers in areas where we can access affordable, clean and plentiful energy resources,” Lochmiller said. “West Texas really fits that mold where it’s one of the most consistently windy and bright locations in the United States.”

Lochmiller said he expects the Trump administration, regardless of the president’s opposition to wind farms, akropolistravel.com to be pragmatic in supporting wind-powered data centers when it is “in fact the most affordable method to gain access to energy.”

Data centers taken in about 4.4% of all U.S. electricity in 2023 and that ´ s expected to increase to 6.7% to 12% of total U.S. electricity by 2028, according to the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

The other states where OpenAI is actively looking include Arizona, California, Florida, Louisiana, Maryland, asteroidsathome.net Nevada, New York City, Ohio, Utah, Virginia, Washington and West Virginia. Heyde said the business only plans to develop “somewhere in between five to 10” schools in total, depending on how large every one is.

OpenAI formerly depended on service partner Microsoft for its computing requires. But the two companies recently amended their partnership to enable OpenAI to pursue data center development on its own.

Associated Press author Jamey Keaten added to this report.

The Associated Press and OpenAI have a licensing and technology contract that enables OpenAI access to part of AP ´ s text archives.