A new EPRI report raises projections of data center power demand growth by 60% from a similar report the research organization prepared two years ago.
“Powering Intelligence 2026” estimates data centers could consume as much as 17% of U.S. electricity by 2030 but might consume as little as 9%.
While the low growth estimate still would be a substantial increase over present-day data center power use, it would be far short of some of the high-end projections being offered in this and other analyses.
EPRI said the effort to more narrowly estimate future demand is hampered by the number and gravity of variables at play: what percentage of announced projects actually get built; how quickly they ramp up; what gains are made in energy efficiency; and what constraints the supply chain, labor market and permitting regimes impose.
For this reason, the report offers three possible scenarios rather than one prediction, and it looks only as far as 2030.
The report also urges better collaboration among data center developers, energy suppliers, equipment vendors, policymakers and communities to better execute a period of rapid demand growth — industrial users and electric vehicle operators are expected to place additional stress on the grid at the same time as a wave of data centers comes online.
“As this analysis shows, the scale and speed of data center growth represent a defining moment for the U.S. power system,” EPRI Vice President of Electrification and Sustainable Energy Strategy David Porter said in a Feb. 26 news release announcing the report.
In the 2024 analysis, EPRI projected data centers would consume 4.6 to 9.1% of U.S. electricity generation by 2030.
Largely because of the record levels of development since that was published, the 2026 analysis boosts the estimate to 9 to 17%.
That would be 56 to 132 GW of nominal capacity and peak load of 45 to 94 GW, depending on what percent of the announced data centers are fully operational by 2030. Total power use would be 380 to 790 TWh per year.
The increase in demand is expected to be so rapid, EPRI said, that it may reverse the historic pattern of efficiency improvements offsetting increased quantity of computing.
Another change in the 2026 analysis is the generation technology expected to be added to the grid. The 2024 analysis projected significantly higher wind and solar deployment. The update finds that natural gas may dominate near-term supply changes but warns that manufacturing, siting and permitting bottlenecks may constrain generation and transmission development.
EPRI predicts continued growth in the two largest data center markets (Texas and Virginia) and increased interest in states with lesser existing capacity (New Mexico, Ohio, Pennsylvania) or little capacity (Indiana, Louisiana, Mississippi) due to availability of land and power or friendly permitting.
Virginia is the only state where data centers now consume more than 20% of electricity, but seven other states could surpass 20% by 2030 under the medium-growth scenario modeled in the report: Arizona, Iowa, Indiana, Nebraska, Nevada, Oregon and Wyoming.
None, however, would catch up to Virginia, where data centers might account for 39 to 57% of in-state electricity use in 2030.
The report is based on state-level data on operational capacity, construction in progress and announced plans.
EPRI repeatedly flags the difficulty of estimating load growth because of the confidentiality in which some details are cloaked and because of the speculative nature of many projects that are publicly disclosed, as well as the fundamental uncertainty about the future evolution of artificial intelligence.
EPRI offers some of its own collaborative initiatives — DCFlex, GET SET, Mercury, Distributed Data Centers — as steps toward better managing the planning and preparation for data center growth.
It also suggests that growth projections be updated regularly and that growth modeling be calibrated to data center load profiles and use patterns as more of these data points become available.
The report concludes, as have many other observers and analysts, that demand flexibility on the part of Big Tech would be impactful.
“Through EPRI’s DCFlex initiative, we’re working across the power and digital ecosystems to make data centers more flexible and better integrated with the electricity system,” Porter said. “Collaboration will be key to ensuring reliable and affordable energy for all.”
