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America’s insatiable hunger for AI and cloud computing is about to produce one of the largest energy infrastructure buildouts in recent memory. Moody’s Ratings projects the US will need to pour $110 billion into constructing 45 gigawatts of new power generation capacity by 2030, just to keep the lights on at the nation’s rapidly multiplying data centers.
Natural gas leads, nuclear barely registers
More than 30 GW of the new capacity will come from natural gas-fired plants, requiring an additional 4 billion cubic feet per day of gas supply. Solar energy and battery storage will handle the rest. Nuclear energy is expected to contribute less than 5% of new capacity, coming almost entirely from reactor restarts, not new builds.
US data centers are projected to consume 426 terawatt-hours of electricity by 2030. That would double their share of total national electricity demand to 10%, up from roughly 5% today.
Who pays for all of this
Moody’s estimates that annual US electricity costs could rise by $25 to $30 billion as a result of this infrastructure expansion. Data center operators themselves could directly fund up to $15 billion of the buildout through behind-the-meter projects, representing about 30% of total planned capacity. The remaining costs will flow through utilities, ratepayers, and public infrastructure budgets.
Power availability remains one of the most significant barriers to data center expansion, with grid operators in key markets like Northern Virginia and parts of Texas struggling to keep up with interconnection requests. Local opposition to new generation projects adds another layer of complexity.
The $3 trillion global picture
Moody’s anticipates at least $3 trillion in global data center investments over the next five years, driven primarily by hyperscale spending from tech giants like Microsoft, Amazon, and Alphabet.
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