On 3 August 2026 the governor of Texas paused new data-centre development while projects already under review are assessed. In the same month's Short-Term Energy Outlook the EIA cut its forecast for Texas electricity load growth in 2027 to 6% growth in Texas load, down from 14% forecast a month earlier
The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) published its Short-Term Energy Outlook in August 2026, which included a revised forecast for Texas electricity load growth. The EIA lowered its forecast for 2027 electricity load growth in Texas to 6%, down from the 14% growth it had projected in its previous Short-Term Energy Outlook. This revision followed an announcement on August 3 by the Texas governor to pause new data center development.
Verified 2026-08-14
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A single policy pause cut a major forecast sharply, showing how much AI power demand depends on government approval.
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- American Electric Power, one of the largest US utilities, which counts hyperscalers and manufacturers among its new large customers, signed fresh load commitments in the third quarter of 2026 and now expects its contracted extra load to reach 84 GW by 2031 AEP signed 15 GW of new load commitments in a single quarter
- AI data centres worldwide reached a power capacity comparable to New York State at peak demand in 2025, which Stanford's AI Index puts at 29.6 gigawatts
- OpenAI does not disclose GPT-4o's resource footprint, so Stanford's 2026 AI Index Report turned to independent researchers' estimates of the water needed to cool the servers behind it — as much as 1.58 million kilolitres a year — more than 1.2 million people drink annually
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