By law they must build their own power plant with the militaries cooperation, reasons why it’s not explained.

You have the reason why right above, though Stratos will use about double the state’s present energy consumption (9 GW compared to 4 GW), and the reasons why the MIDA is involved is because it sits on land under their jurisdiction, along with it being more of a one-stop shop, as it were, with permitting, bond issuing, zoning, etc.

I can’t help but thinking it’s just a fad, that there will be revolution in technology that’ll make all these data centers obsolete. A race to control everything! One ring to rule them all… probably a breakthrough in quantum technology.

Quantum computing won’t obsolete data centers, because quantum systems are generally good at things like quantum physics, cryptography, and materials simulations. What data centers are mainly used for are web services, streaming, cloud computing, AI inference, and databases. It’s far more likely demand for data centers will go up, not down, with the expansion of quantum computing. Perhaps you mean LLMs are a fad, but data centers do quite a bit more than that.

Like the Tolamac reactors using Fusion instead of fission but still having nuclear by products. The idea was sold on promises that they can’t deliver because the technology is not there, just throw another billion dollars at it and will get it right?… I saw an article last year that they’ve built 77 of these Tolamac reactors without success… What was the definition of insanity? 100 billion wasted? I suppose the money could be used to make bombs with an expiring shelf-life that wars are created just to use up the old stock pile.

I think you mean tokamaks. They don’t ‘use’ fission or fusion, it’s a device specifically designed to create fusion reactions. You can’t take a nuclear power plant and substitute one for the other. The potential of fusion energy is substantially greater than the amount of money we’ve spent on it; whether it’s worth pursuing or not is if you think that enabling everything from fast transport across the solar system, to very cheap desalination, to atomic-scale recycling, is worthwhile, or not.

Jeff Wright,

The revolution is analog AI

This has a fairly narrow application and won’t replace data centers or silicon-based hardware.

The revolution is analog AI

A step
https://techxplore.com/news/2026-05-silicon-oscillators-problems-thousands-years.html

Talking about data centers in orbit, they can’t build mega complexes like this in orbit without nuclear power.

A big controversy here in Utah, 40,000 acres (62 Square miles) purchased in the salt Marsh on the north side of the great Salt Lake (under the Hill Air Force training flight pattern).

STRATOS VS. EVERY UTAH DATA CENTER COMBINED
3×
BIGGER AT PHASE 1
10×
BIGGER AT FULL BUILDOUT
ALL 48 UTAH DATA CENTERS COMBINED DRAW ~920 MW. STRATOS PHASE 1 = 3,000 MW. FULL = 9,000 MW

(that’s 1/2 of the power the entire state consumes)
By law they must build their own power plant with the militaries cooperation, reasons why it’s not explained.
There’s thousands of oil wells throughout the Uinta basin, southern Wyoming and western Colorado. They provide the crude oil for the seven refineries in North Salt Lake city, which provides the gas and diesel fuel for the entire west coast through pipelines built since 2012. With the oil, they discovered vast fields of liquid natural gas. The new data centers plan on consuming it as quickly as possible… Who would’ve thunk it the way the environmentalist claim the carbon is destroying our atmosphere and our planet?

There’s data centers in every state now, hundreds in Virginia and California. Utah has 13 large ones with 14 more planned and under construction. (Most of them under 1000 MW) The huge power plant in Delta that was decommissioned that formally provided Southern California with power is being refitted for natural gas. The data center there announced last year is called a giga site, when finished it will be the largest in the world.

I can’t help but thinking it’s just a fad, that there will be revolution in technology that’ll make all these data centers obsolete. A race to control everything! One ring to rule them all… probably a breakthrough in quantum technology.
Personally I believe it’s all hype, billionaires not knowing to what to do with their money and just doing what all the other billionaires are doing. Like the Tolamac reactors using Fusion instead of fission but still having nuclear by products. The idea was sold on promises that they can’t deliver because the technology is not there, just throw another billion dollars at it and will get it right?… I saw an article last year that they’ve built 77 of these Tolamac reactors without success… What was the definition of insanity? 100 billion wasted? I suppose the money could be used to make bombs with an expiring shelf-life that wars are created just to use up the old stock pile.

Mineral rights maybe but he will pay a huge price for that.

Political leverage. Obviously. If Florida or Texas presses him he could use the new property to threaten a move.

An LNG port for his fuel. I can see that. They are pretty much just a dock. enough tanks to hold a ship load of fuel.and a pipeline. That could all be hurricane proofed pretty easy.

And 90% of that land could still be set aside or just protected for environmental or ecology reasons. Elon could easily let eco scientists access to the land for monitoring. Its not like he could keep them out totally.

When this whole Boca Chica Space X thing was starting up I looked for land close by that I could use to watch launches. I found an almost 500 acre piece of swamp land that was for sale but the state required the new owner did no improvements to it and it would be left open for researchers to have full access to it all the time. As the owner I would be allowed to fish on it and keep a house boat, yacht on it to live on. But not permanently.

If I had the cash to toss away I might have bought it but resale value stank.

You don’t need everything in one big place…Alabama has lots of old, already developed (but rusting) properties that can be razed to the ground along the length of the state. The Tenn Tom is usable too.

BTW….I hear they blew up the deluge.

How can you blow up a deluge?

Elon, you need a new set of good ole boys who actually know what they are doing.

At one point way back there was talk of launching rocket launches from repurposed oil platforms operating out of Mobile, w rockets built in Huntsville.

But if that is purchased, and he isn’t allowed to do anything with it because wetlands—bad move.

Alabama would treat him like Saban or Bear. He would be welcomed.

Maybe Elon’s an LSU fan.

Politically, it also makes Jared Isaacman’s job of winding down SLS and Orion much easier. Sen. Kennedy, even at his advanced age, should be turning handsprings if this comes off. They’d have to relocate, but there would be jobs for current Boeing workers at Michoud and a lot more besides.

There are other lessees of space at Michoud than Boeing. If Boeing clears out, one assumes any firms remaining would have right of first refusal on taking over the vacated space and almost certainly on more attractive terms than their current leases. That would offset the wage increases they’d have to pay their own employees to keep them from decamping to jobs in Elon’s tidewater duchy.

Among other things, this news appears to nicely answer the question of what Elon intends to do with all of that money he expects to raise from the SpaceX initial public offering.

I have suggested this before, but Elon needs to go to Mobile Alabama if for no other reason than the vast stainless steel plants nearby.

If he REALLY wants to conquer space, Mobile is the only sensible place. Less spartan than Boca, but not as busy as the mouth of the Mississippi. That state is spiritually dark as well. Alabama did not get ONE tornado warning this past April—typically our most dangerous month. This state is prayed up, especially following Charlie.

The SLS pathfinder, the same size as Starship and also made of steel….made in Birmingham far from the coast. We have a port of call in Birmingport he could buy for a song. The Mobile river can ferry materials to him.

The number one reason he should come to my state is political protection. If he wants to replace SLS, then HE must replace SLS.

I saw Jared talk about “no commercial replacement just yet, but surely”….that came off a bit weird.

We are also fighters here—unlike the CCC, we don’t roll over easy…but that is another asset. To steal a quote from Michael Ironsides—everybody fights, no one quits.

I invite Elon to come to Alabama…especially the sugar sands of Dauphin Island and thereabouts.

They are worldbeaters.

The idea isn’t for SpaceX to produce its own natural gas. That wouldn’t supply nearly enough. The key is to have direct access to the global market for LNG, in huge quantities.

Ronaldus Magnus: there are state wildlife refuges nearby on either side of this parcel.

Finally, there is the possibility this location could also serve as a spaceport, though it would only work well for polar orbits.

Sounds great for launching data centers to sun-synchronous orbit. Also of interest is that a fellow on X named Ozan Bellik (who is part of a group building another launch vehicle) had just suggested to his team they should try launching from Louisiana: https://x.com/BellikOzan/status/2050791038739181732?s=20