Celebrity investor and Shark Tank star Kevin O’Leary has been making waves in media cycles lately as news of his proposed hyperscale data center has made its way to the surface. O’Leary plans to build a massive hyperscale data center project in Box Elder County, Utah, joining the ranks of only five other hyperscale data centers in America.
The data center project will be built on 40,000 acres in unincorporated Box Elder County and consists of private landowner agreements and 1,200 acres that include a section of the Utah Test and Training Range, a Department of Defense site. There are myriad details to unpack regarding the data center plans, the approval required from the Box Elder County Commission, public sentiment, proposed tax breaks, and the economic incentives, or disincentives, for the surrounding communities and Utah as a whole.
Proponents of the hyperscale data center say it will fund modern building at nearby Hill Air Force Base, clean all the water it uses so that it can be sent back to the Great Salt Lake, and ultimately create 2,000 “high-paying” jobs in the rural Utah area. Additionally, O’Leary has been reported on record telling the Military Installation Development Authority (MIDA) that the project is a way to foster economic competition with China on the technology front.
While these are all laudable goals, there is a significant detail in the data center plan that greatly affects and challenges widely accepted views on sources of energy.
One of the most important pieces to the puzzle regarding data center development lies in energy production. While data centers initially appear to be golden eggs for economic development and tax revenue, if states do not have affordable and reliable sources of energy, as well as sound energy transmission infrastructure, the massive amount of power these behemoths require will become a burden on any state in many ways. Large energy demands in states that do not prioritize affordable and reliable sources of energy will certainly lead to disruptions in energy availability and increased costs for ratepayers. In these cases, data center development is harmful to a state’s economic well-being and irresponsible to citizens in the surrounding communities.
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This is a proven phenomenon. According to a September 2025 report from the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS), in seven states serviced by the large, regional transmission organization PJM Interconnection—Illinois, Maryland, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and West Virginia—utility customers have collectively paid $4.4 billion for transmission upgrades needed to connect large data centers in 2024 alone.
The way to solve this problem and responsibly build data centers is to ensure that the data centers fund and build their own sources of energy – behind the meter – and guarantee energy abundance by relying on affordable and reliable sources of energy. Most notably, this would be natural gas and coal. Renewable sources of energy are not going to be able to satisfy the herculean demands of data center operations.
It seems that the famed investor and Utah officials understand that commonsense premise – or they did.
It was reported that MIDA approved an agreement between O’Leary and TallGrass Energy to strike a deal in order to develop a natural gas utility service through a connection to the Ruby Pipeline. The Ruby Pipeline is a 680-mile natural gas pipeline running from Opal, Wyoming, to Malin, Oregon, crossing northern Utah and Nevada.
When news of the hyperscale data center first broke, the reliance on natural gas was the only plan, and the only narrative. However, in the weeks since, outcry from environmentalists and associated environmental nonprofits seems to have pressured the investor into announcing a potential pivot.
O’Leary shared a post on X saying, “We can also put a percentage of the power generation through solar, wind and batteries, because the battery technology is 10x more efficient than it was just five years ago.”
Despite that post, O’Leary has not officially committed to using renewables in any capacity. The supposed shift in plans for energy sourcing unequivocally contradicts the first official statements made by Box Elder County officials.
Regardless of this confusion, the hyperscale data center was unanimously approved by the Box Elder County Commission to begin breaking ground on the project in the fall. Currently, Utah residents are protesting to postpone the development of the data center and turn it into a ballot initiative.
Overall, it will be interesting to follow along and see what the finalized energy portfolio looks like if, and when, the hyperscale facility is fully up and operational. If the initial plans are any indicator, it is clear once again that those who truly need energy realize how to best get it affordably and reliably.
Samantha Fillmore (sfillmore@heartland.org) is the senior state government relations manager at The Heartland Institute.
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