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Anthropic joins AI’s natural gas frenzy, buys $3.4B worth of turbines
TechCrunch • • business
Key Points:
- Anthropic, an AI company planning to go public this year, is investing $3.4 billion in natural gas turbines, marking a shift from its usual preference for renting computing infrastructure.
- The company is purchasing Caterpillar generators capable of producing up to 1.7 gigawatts of electricity, originally ordered by equipment supplier OnePWR, which failed to secure financing.
- Anthropic currently pays $1.25 billion per month to SpaceX subsidiary xAI for computing power and plans to enter into more similar rental contracts despite this new purchase.
- The move reflects growing power supply challenges in the AI industry, including long backlogs for natural gas turbines and delays in connecting to the electrical grid.
- Other major tech firms like Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and Meta have also been investing in on-site natural gas power plants to support their data centers amid increasing energy demands.
