Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro signs a binding executive order restricting data-center permitting the same week a leaked NRSC memo warns AI companies that data centers could cost Republicans an Ohio Senate seat — plus a filed $105 billion Nvidia guarantee for OpenAI's Ohio campus, a site-control ruling on West Virginia's contested Ridgeline complex, and a fight over who profits from PJM's capacity crunch.

• Governor Shapiro Signs Executive Order on Data Center Development — Commonwealth of Pennsylvania
• Reporting: Shapiro Data Center Rules Executive Order — Axios Pittsburgh
• Reporting: Data Centers, AI, Political Opinion — Axios
• Reporting: Republicans Turn on Data Centers Ahead of Midterms — Washington Examiner
• Contested 5-GW Ridgeline Gas, Solar, and Data-Center Complex in West Virginia Clears Site-Control Question — POWER Magazine
• Reporting: WV DEP Says Fundamental Data Controls Site — West Virginia Watch
• Nvidia Backs OpenAI's Ohio Data Center Buildout With $105B Guarantee — Data Center Knowledge
• Reporting: Nvidia Financing OpenAI Data Center Ohio — CNBC
• PJM Capacity Auction Procures 138,318 MW of Generation Resources — PJM Interconnection
• Reporting: PJM Board Backstop Capacity Auction — Utility Dive

Concrete Compute is an AI-voiced podcast, built and run by a real person. Nothing in this episode is financial advice.

PJM asks FERC for a new rule that puts new mega-loads first in line for curtailment unless they bring their own power — plus a $12 billion grid-modeling controversy, a contested FERC transmission order, Amazon's private Texas gas plant, the Cherokee Nation's new data center ban, and Groq's halved valuation.

• Linked sources: PJM's New Deal for Data Centers: Bring Power or Face Cuts — Data Center Knowledge
• Linked sources: Dylan Patel on PJM's $12B grid modeling waste — X/@dylan522p
• Linked sources: FERC approves MISO cost recovery plan for PJM-footprint transmission — Utility Dive
• Linked sources: Amazon Explores Grid Connection for 8,000-Acre AI Campus — Data Center Knowledge
• Linked sources: Cherokee Nation Bans Data Center Development — DCD
• Linked sources: Groq raises $350m, with Nvidia participation planned — DCD

Concrete Compute is an AI-voiced podcast, built and run by a real person. Nothing in this episode is financial advice.

Nvidia, OpenAI and SB Energy confirm the PORTS-Pike campus in Pike County, Ohio — but the SEC-filed guarantee behind it has shrunk from a discussed $250 billion to $105 billion in a week, reviving circular-financing questions Jensen Huang tried to shut down on X. Plus: New South Wales mandates wind power for new data centers, a Texas gas-plus-nuclear plant advances toward powering a Crusoe campus, Kentucky taxpayers question fifty-year tax breaks, an X thread argues grid infrastructure is the real AI bottleneck, and Sunrun brings home batteries into the hyperscaler capacity push.

• Linked sources: NVIDIA Guarantees SB Energy's PORTS-Pike Technology Campus — NVIDIA Newsroom
• New South Wales to require new data centers run 40% on wind energy — DCD
• Blue Energy, GE Vernova Hitachi advance 2.5GW gas-plus-nuclear plant — DCD
• Kentucky's data center tax breaks — Kentucky Center for Economic Policy
• Power/grid is the real AI ceiling, not silicon — @MelvinInvests on X
• Sunrun, Voltus Bring Home Batteries Into AI Capacity Push — Data Center Knowledge

Concrete Compute is an AI-voiced podcast, built and run by a real person. Nothing in this episode is financial advice.

Nvidia's financing guarantee for OpenAI's ten-gigawatt Ohio campus reportedly shrank from $250 billion to under $120 billion this week, even as Nvidia weighs a separate stake in SB Energy — while Chicago moves toward a data center moratorium, a Missouri landowner defies the national pushback, and the industry debates whether power or demand is the real bottleneck.

• Linked sources: Nvidia scales back funding guarantee for Ohio OpenAI data center — Reuters (reporting)
• Nvidia in talks to invest $3B in SB Energy — The Information
• Mayor's executive order on data centers — City of Chicago Mayor's Press Office
• Chicago moratorium coverage — WBEZ Chicago
• Q1 2026 opposition tracker — Data Center Watch
• Data center opposition rising — NBC News
• As A.I. Data Centers Spread, Pressure Mounts to Share Profits — The New York Times (reporting)
• IREN co-CEO Daniel Roberts on AI demand vs. power supply — X

Concrete Compute is an AI-voiced podcast, built and run by a real person. Nothing in this episode is financial advice.

This week's recap: Virginia forces Dominion to make data centers pay their own transmission costs, Amazon withdraws a 500-megawatt Maryland campus after an election upset, a Michigan moratorium fight turns dangerous, and PJM rewrites grid rules after a record 3.8-gigawatt load drop. Plus SpaceX's off-grid Texas chip fab, neocloud earnings, Ontario's new community-benefits framework, and Nvidia's $500B financing push.

• Virginia regulators order Dominion to directly assign transmission costs to data centers — DCD
• AWS data center withdrawal signals growing political, community challenges — Data Center Knowledge
• Data center-related threats made against local authorities in Marshall, Michigan — DCD
• PJM proposes framework to connect data centers without compromising reliability, affordability — PJM Inside Lines
• SpaceX plans to power $16.8B Terafab without the grid — Data Center Knowledge
• Neocloud results Q2 2026: CoreWeave, Nebius, Cerebras — DCD
• Ontario unveils new data center framework to support industry investment — DCD
• Nvidia's $500B AI infrastructure bet raises power stakes — Data Center Knowledge

Concrete Compute is an AI-voiced podcast, built and run by a real person. Nothing in this episode is financial advice.