Project dossier · Berwick, Pennsylvania

AWS Berwick Under construction

Part of Project Rainier. Chip types: Trainium2. Epoch AI estimates ~108 MW.

Key facts

Operator
Amazon
Owner
Amazon
Tenant
Anthropic
Size
108 MW
Location
Berwick, Pennsylvania
Stage today
Under construction

Source
read 2026-08-14

What to do next

Next step: Under construction — pull the approved conditions and permits and hold the builder to them; an expansion or a new building reopens the record.

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What has happened so far (18 events)

  • 2024-03-04announcement
    AWS acquired Talen Energy's Cumulus Data campus adjacent to the Susquehanna nuclear power station in Salem Township, Luzerne County, PA for $650 million ($350M at closing, $300M at milestones), gaining access to a 960 MW data center campus directly connected to the 2,520 MW nuclear plant. · source
  • 2024-05-30rezoning
    AWS was granted a 1,600-acre rezoning request and announced plans for a 15-building data center campus at the Pennsylvania nuclear site in Salem Township. · source
  • 2024-11-01ruling
    FERC voted 2-1 to reject PJM's proposed interconnection agreement that would have expanded Amazon's co-located data center load at Susquehanna from 300 MW to 480 MW, citing concerns about cost fairness and grid reliability precedent. · source
  • 2025-04-11ruling
    FERC upheld its rejection of the proposed interconnection agreement between AWS's data center and the Susquehanna nuclear plant, denying Talen Energy's rehearing request. · source
  • 2025-06-09announcement
    Governor Shapiro announced at a Berwick event that Amazon plans to invest at least $20 billion in Pennsylvania data centers, the largest private-sector investment in state history, with Salem Township (Luzerne County) and Falls Township (Bucks County) as the first two identified sites, creating at least 1,250 jobs. · source
  • 2025-06-11financing
    Talen Energy and AWS announced a restructured 17-year, $18 billion power purchase agreement for up to 1,920 MW from Susquehanna nuclear station, converting the behind-the-meter arrangement to a grid-connected front-of-the-meter model to comply with FERC's ruling, with full volume delivery by 2032. · source
  • 2025-10-10construction
    Amazon reported that data center campus construction in Salem Township was proceeding at a rapid pace. · source
  • 2025-12-19coverage
    Nonprofit Quarterly published an investigative feature titled 'A Canary in a Coal Mine: Amazon's Luzerne County Data Center,' examining community and environmental concerns including energy demand, water quality, tax exemptions, and employment claims. · source
  • 2026-03-12utility
    The Susquehanna River Basin Commission approved an increase in consumptive water use for the Amazon data center in Salem Township from 60,000 to 129,000 gallons per day (reduced from the initial request of 277,000 gpd), sourced from PA American Water (Berwick). · source
  • 2026-03-17announcement
    Blackstone-owned QTS spent $580 million to acquire land in Salem Township for a separate data center campus adjacent to the Amazon site, with plans for 12 to 17 data centers. · source
  • 2026-03-18announcement
    96 Salem Township landowners completed a historic 1,700-acre land sale to QTS for more than $500 million for a major data center campus adjacent to the Amazon site, with Salem Township receiving a $9 million community benefit agreement. · source
  • 2026-03-19coverage
    WNEP reported that the community of Salem Township is now encircled by new data center developments, with multiple campuses under construction or planned in the area. · source
  • 2026-06-09incentive
    Amazon donated $250,000 to the Bloomsburg Area YMCA for a new STEM lab as data center construction near Berwick continued. · source
  • 2026-06-15coverage
    The Citizens' Voice reported that a third data center in Salem Township could generate $1.2 billion for landowners, reflecting the scale of data center land acquisition in the area. · source
  • 2026-06-23coverage
    The Center Square reported on the role of big money and enforced silence (NDAs) in Pennsylvania's data center push, covering the Salem Township/Amazon development. · source
  • 2026-07-29moratorium
    Salem Township paused new data center projects pending a zoning amendment, responding to community concerns about the pace of development. · source
  • 2026-07-30coverage
    State representatives were denied access to the Amazon data center in Salem Township, as reported by the Citizens' Voice. · source
  • 2026-08-14environmental
    PA DEP published notice inviting public comments (deadline September 14, 2026) on an air quality permit for 84 backup diesel generators, 2 auxiliary emergency generators, and fuel storage tanks for an expansion of the existing Amazon data center in Salem Township. · source

Find the paper trail

Find the paper trail (0 filed · 11 places to look)

State environmental permits

Backup generators, water withdrawal and stormwater are permitted by the state, usually earlier and in more detail than anything filed locally.

County & town filings

The rezoning application, site plan, traffic and noise studies, staff report and every revision.

  • Search Berwick planning filingssearchPlanning departments post application files under many different names. Find the department, then ask the clerk for the application number — that number unlocks everything else.
  • Search Berwick property records / GISsearchThe parcel record names the buying LLC and the sale date, which is what ties an anonymous filing to an operator.

Utility & grid records

The electricity request is filed with the grid operator and the utility long before the town hears about it — and states the real load.

Federal databases

Works anywhere, and covers the operator's record at its other sites.

  • EPA ECHO facility searchEvery federally-reported air, water and waste permit at a facility, plus its inspection and violation history. Search by address or draw a radius around the site. This project's locality centres on 41.060, -76.240 — search that point with a 5-mile radius.
  • EPA EnvirofactsThe same underlying records, queryable by county — useful for 'what else is permitted near this site' rather than one facility.
  • EPA Facility Registry ServiceResolves the shell LLC on a permit to the facility it belongs to. Worth a look when the filing name means nothing locally.

These are places to look, not evidence that anything has been filed. Links were checked on 2026-08-21; search links are queries, not records. What to ask for.

Around here

Other tracked projects in Pennsylvania

Cite this page: GridWatch AI, “AWS Berwick”, aigridwatch.com/projects/aws-berwick, retrieved 2026-10-11.

As of August 2026 (2m ago) · changes weekly — re-check before citing

A working set of identified proposals a community can track, not a census — most of the country's activity is not in here yet. Pennsylvania is the exception: its rows are synced from PA DEP's own data-center permit tracker, so the state's coverage is close to complete and carries the permit trail with it. **Each row carries its own provenance.** Rows showing a verification date link to reporting or the governing body's own record and were read on that date; rows marked *unverified* have no source on record — a lead to check, not a fact to cite. **Stage is derived, not asserted.** *Hearing scheduled*, *Awaiting decision*, *Approved* and *Withdrawn* are computed from each row's milestone dates on every rebuild, so a hearing date that has passed stops reading 'scheduled'. Hearings get moved and projects re-file under new names — treat a scheduled date as the earliest to act by, and confirm with the clerk before relying on it. Leads are mined into data/project_candidates.json and promoted here only after a human reads a primary source.

Part of the data center project tracker — open data, CC BY 4.0 (JSON · CSV).

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