Courtesy of Kentucky Lantern
July 29, 2026
More than $100 billion in private investment will go to build a massive hyperscale data center along with new natural gas-fired power plants at the former Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant in McCracken County, the U.S. Department of Energy announced Wednesday.
The public-private partnership – including data center developer Brookfield, energy company NextEra Energy and local and regional electric utilities including Big Rivers Electric Power Corporation – will develop parts of the former nuclear enrichment plant for an “artificial intelligence and high-performance computing (HPC) innovation campus,” the DOE release said. The data center campus would have an electric capacity of 1.8 gigawatts, making it among the largest power-intensive hyperscale data centers so far proposed in Kentucky.
In a provided statement, U.S. Secretary of Energy Chris Wright said the federal government “is leveraging its assets — like our federal lands — to add power generation, create jobs, and ensure the United States wins the AI race.
“By transforming former DOE sites into engines of innovation and economic growth, we can revitalize communities with increased tax revenue and thousands of jobs, while also strengthening America’s energy security,” Wright said.
NextEra Energy will also install at or near the former Paducah plant two gigawatts of natural gas-fired generation and up to 2.6 gigawatts of battery storage, the release states. The project is expected to create 8,000 construction jobs and 600 permanent jobs.
Wright, speaking on “Fox & Friends” Wednesday morning, blamed Democrats for a “fear campaign” surrounding data centers, claiming that data centers reduce electricity prices, not increase them. He said Democrats “have spent 17 years pushing up electricity prices” and “figure they’ve got the perfect scapegoat” with data centers.
Kentucky Senate President Robert Stivers, R-Manchester, in a column released Tuesday also voiced broad support for data center development in Kentucky. He wrote that while some have “legitimate questions” regarding data centers and impacts on electric bills, water usage and noise, he said communities can be protected and jobs can be created at the same time.
“Economic development should never come at the expense of the people who already live here. That’s why Kentucky’s approach matters,” Stivers wrote. “When developers pay the full cost of the infrastructure they require, modern technology minimizes environmental impacts, and communities receive lasting economic benefits. We can welcome investment without asking our citizens to shoulder the burden.”
Paducah Mayor George Bray, who’s running as an independent candidate for McCracken County judge-executive, told the Lantern he knows there will be skepticism with the data center project — as seen with other data center proposals — but he promised to be transparent with the public moving forward.
“It’s affirmation that Paducah is really right at the cutting edge of the next generation of technology and energy,” Bray said about the projects.
The DOE has worked for decades to clean up groundwater contamination at the site, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency listed it as a Superfund site in 1994 due to decades of soil and water contamination by hazardous and radioactive wastes.
The data center project is among a flurry of activity surrounding the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant over the past 12 months, spurred by the Trump administration’s two-pronged push to promote the siting of data centers and promote the development of nuclear energy.
The federal department in July 2025 selected the former Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant as one of four sites where private developers will be invited to develop “cutting edge AI data center and energy generation projects.”
General Matter, a nuclear fuel enrichment startup seeking to create fuel for advanced, modular nuclear reactors, also signed a lease last year with the DOE to eventually enrich uranium at the site. Another nuclear fuel enrichment startup, Global Laser Enrichment, is looking to use lasers to enrich and reuse spent uranium fuel near the DOE site and plans to invest almost $1.8 billion to establish operations there. A Kentucky environmental legal group is challenging whether the federal government can provide the spent uranium fuel to Global Laser Enrichment.
Some residents in McCracken County, including those living adjacent to the DOE site, in recent months have organized through a group called Protect McCracken County that opposes the nuclear fuel enrichment developments. WKMS reported that Erica Moore, who helped start Protect McCracken County, suggested to county officials in May the startups share the costs for an environmental impact study of the developments with any artificial intelligence company looking to establish there.
Moore told the Lantern Tuesday afternoon that the group is not against development in general, but the group wants an independent environmental impact assessment of all the projects — the data center and the nuclear startups — because “nobody’s doing it.”
“Our biggest concern with all of these projects is that you’re doing it on a Superfund site,” Moore said. “The ask is very reasonable.”
Bray said he didn’t think an independent environmental study is “really in the cards” because of the federal government’s control over the DOE site and questions involved — how such a study would be funded, or who would choose the firm conducting the study. He said he believed constituents could still be protected through local regulation and oversight.
“There’s a train going downhill with General Matter and this data center, and the Department of Energy is leasing the land and choosing the partners,” Bray said.
This story has been updated.
Kentucky Lantern is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Kentucky Lantern maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Linda Blackford for questions: info@kentuckylantern.com.
