Project dossier · Milam County, Texas

OpenAI Stargate Milam Operating

Part of Stargate.

Key facts

Operator: Softbank
Owner: Softbank
Tenant: OpenAI
Location: Milam County, Texas
Stage today: Operating

Source
read 2026-08-14

What to do next

Next step: Already operating — the leverage now is enforcement: noise and water conditions, tax revenue tracking, and any expansion filing, which reopens the record.

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What has happened so far (17 events)

2025-01-21announcement
President Trump announced the Stargate Project, a $500 billion AI infrastructure joint venture by OpenAI, SoftBank, and Oracle, with initial deployment in Texas. · source
2025-01-28announcement
Data Center Dynamics reported that solar power and battery storage systems are planned for the Stargate AI data center campus in Milam County. · source
2025-05-12announcement
Austin Business Journal reported a $3 billion data center campus planned in Milam County by SB Energy, before a tenant had been publicly identified. · source
2025-06-09coverage
The Real Deal reported that SB Energy's planned $3B Milam County data center was still searching for an end user and seeking tax breaks. · source
2025-09-23announcement
OpenAI, Oracle, and SoftBank announced an expansion of Stargate with five new AI data center sites across the U.S., including the Milam County, Texas campus. · source
2025-09-25coverage
Austin Business Journal reported that OpenAI would occupy the planned $3B Milam County data center hub as part of the Stargate project. · source
2025-12-03incentive
Austin Business Journal reported the OpenAI data center could create hundreds of jobs as part of a $135 million incentive deal in Milam County. · source
2026-01-09financing
OpenAI and SoftBank Group each invested $500 million in SB Energy; OpenAI leased 1.2 GW of data center capacity for initial buildout in Milam County, Texas, with facilities expected to enter service starting in 2026. · source
2026-01-12coverage
Data Center Dynamics reported that SoftBank's SB Energy would build and operate OpenAI's 1.2 GW Stargate data center in Milam County, Texas. · source
2026-02-10incentive
Milam County Commissioners Court approved a tax abatement for a new data center, as reported by KXXV. · source
2026-03-19coverage
Austin Business Journal reported hints connecting a Silicon Valley company to the takeover of the old 3M campus in Milam County for data center use linked to Stargate. · source
2026-04-17coverage
MySA reported that data center developers made nearly $500 million in moves in Central Texas towns amid water concerns in the Milam County area. · source
2026-04-22permit
Data Center Dynamics reported that OpenAI Stargate's Milam County 'Freebird' data center first phase would span 548,950 square feet. · source
2026-05-12rezoning
The Texas Tribune reported that a Texas county paused data center construction in rural areas for one year, in response to rapid data center expansion in the region. · source
2026-06-16filing
Austin Business Journal reported that one of the world's largest companies (linked to SoftBank) purchased approximately 4,700 acres in Milam County in a detail-sparse land transaction. · source
2026-08-07construction
KCENTV reported that rock trucks driving through downtown Temple were traced to the $470 million OpenAI data center construction project in Milam County. · source
2026-08-12operational
SB Energy committed to comply with Governor Abbott's data center transparency and accountability standards for Texas, alongside Core Scientific and Vantage Data Centers. · source

Find the paper trail

Find the paper trail (1 filed · 11 places to look)

Permits already on file (1)

Filings we have a source for — the record, not a place to look for one.

2026-04-22
Data Center Dynamics reported that OpenAI Stargate's Milam County 'Freebird' data center first phase would span 548,950 square feet. · source

State environmental permits

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

Texas TCEQ — Air Permits DivisionThe program page: which permits this state requires, and the office that issues them.
TCEQ Central RegistrySearchable public filings — search the operator, the shell LLC on the deed, and the address.

County & town filings

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

Search Milam County 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 Milam County 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.

ERCOT (Texas) — interconnection queueRequested megawatts, queue position and target in-service date. The MW here is the real number; the one at the town meeting is often phase one.
Public Utility Commission of Texas — docket searchSpecial contracts, large-load tariffs and rate cases are docketed here. Testimony and exhibits are public, and are usually more candid than the press release.
FERC eLibraryFederal filings: transmission agreements, interconnection service agreements, and co-location disputes.
Search the serving utility for a will-serve lettersearchThe will-serve or load-service letter is the utility's own written commitment. Ask the utility and the PUC for it by name — it is frequently the first document to exist.

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 30.750, -96.900 — 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

Milam County community briefing — Enactedterm not documented
Texas briefing — rates, grid carbon, PUC contacts.

Other tracked projects in Texas

Meta Temple — Temple, 37 mi Operating
BCG Cedar Creek Campus — Cedar Creek (Bastrop County), 58 mi Awaiting decision
Google Midlothian — Midlothian, 118 mi Under construction
Compass Datacenters Red Oak campus — Red Oak (Ellis County), 122 mi Approved
Google Red Oak — Red Oak, 122 mi Operating

Cite this page: GridWatch AI, “OpenAI Stargate Milam”, aigridwatch.com/projects/openai-stargate-milam, 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).