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While we debate how much electricity AI needs, China already has a data center that runs on clean energy

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The first data center Artificial Intelligence Powered by China’s Wind Power. This is an innovative facility in the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, in the northwestern part of the country, and has a renewable energy supply that allows it to operate using 100% clean electricity. This means everything a milestone for the Asian country and also for the global industry if we take into account the debate that sparks the enormous environmental impact of these infrastructures. Less emissions into the atmosphere. According to what the media shares South China Morning Postthe IA data center’s renewable energy plant generates 4.3 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity per year, reducing carbon emissions into the atmosphere by 3.65 million tons. Furthermore, the installation reaches a 1.15 in the energy use efficiency indicator (PUE), which measures the entire power of a facility and the energy expenditure of data centers. To put this in context, the industry’s average PUE has been 1.56 over the last 5 years, according to the Global Data Center Survey 2025 by Uptime Institute. A score of 1.0 would be a perfect PUE, according to this organization. Data in the East, Computing in the West. The implementation of this AI data center is part of a broader strategic plan that the Asian country is carrying out to reinforce the infrastructure that supports the development of AI using renewable energy. With the name in English Eastern Data, Western Computing (EDWC), this national megaproject seeks to move data processing from the more developed eastern areas of China to the rural western regions, which have much better and abundant environmental conditions for renewable energy sources. This would be the case of the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region. In this way, the Asian giant plans to face the increase in energy demand in the coming yearswhich may be double in 2030 according to some forecasts. Voracious consumption. The AI data centersdespite being very similar to traditional data centers, work with a greater processing demand, which makes them true energy guzzlers. The ICT consulting company Gartner predicts that the electricity consumption of this type of locations will reach 565 TWh this 2026. Regarding its impact, a recent study carried out by Allianz reveals that the emissions associated with this type of centers reached 286 megatons of carbon dioxide in 2025 and their carbon footprint has been 57% larger than what the IEA had originally calculated. Among the resources that have been used the most, electricity consumption is at the top, responsible for 76% of that footprint. For this reason, the report suggests that moving towards a greener AI will depend, above all, on transforming the energy systems that feed it and betting on renewable resources such as wind energywhich has hardly any water or carbon footprint. And here, what are we doing? The “green” outpost What China is taking is of enormous interest for the rest of the world, especially for our continent if we take into account the decarbonization objectives that come from Brussels. The European Union has already contemplated this type of data centers in some of its general energy regulations, such as the Energy Efficiency Directive (EU) 2023/1791which in its article 12 establishes that those centers with more than 500 kW will be obliged to make their energy consumption public. Other standards, such as Delegated Regulation (EU) 2024/1364seek to unify a regime of common assessment for the more than 3,000 installations of this type that exists in the EU. Although there is no shortage of those who see in this regulatory will a reason why Europe could be left behind In the technological race, the truth is that the energy efficiency of data centers, and especially in AI centers, can make a difference. That’s how he thinks Hongpeng LeiHead of the Mitigation Division of the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), for whom betting on more sustainable centers is not an obstacle, but “the path to a resilient and competitive digital infrastructure”. Spain, for its part, is one of the European leaders in renewable energy with more than 55% of the electricity produced with this origin in 2025. This obvious advantage gives it a great potential to build a green-powered next-generation data infrastructure. However, it is worth asking whether the Spanish network will be able to keep pace with the installation of these centers and, consequently, satisfy what is clearly going to be a huge energy demand. For now, The project that Microsoft plans to build in Aragon will consume more energy than the entire autonomous communityan example of the energy challenge that accompanies the development of AI. Image | Paul Hanaoka Xataka | “Only behind the United States”: China has achieved a until recently chimerical position in intelligent computing

The most valuable company in the world has no interest in investing in the data center fever

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Big Tech is investing absolute fortunes in data centers. Almost all of them seem to want to be prepared to meet the colossal demand for computing capacity for AI tasks. And yet, there is a curious and surprising exception. Money, money and more money. The big technology companies have put all the meat on the grill with billion-dollar investment plans in data centers throughout 2025. Amazon, Google, Meta and Microsoft jointly invested more than $416 billion in capex during 2025, 66% more than the $251 billion in 2024. Google reached $91.5 billion, marking a new all-time high; Meta’s investment reached 72.2 billion dollars and Microsoft reached 118 billion. By 2026, the climb continues: Amazon, Microsoft, Alphabet and Meta are jointly committing about 725,000 million dollars in AI infrastructure in 2026, 77% more than in 2025, and analysts already project that the figure will exceed one billion in 2027. To give us a slight idea of ​​what that figure means, it is higher than Sweden GDP in 2025 (662,000 million), that of Israel (610,000 million) and that of Singapore (574,000 million). Apple. However, at Apple things are very different, and its Capex for 2025 remained the same. almost flat compared to 2024 with a total investment of 12,715 million dollars. It is a notable figure, of course, but it is far from the 20 billion dollars that Apple plans to invest in 2026. And she is the one with the most money. It is also interesting to compare the investment that these companies will make with respect to their market capitalization. Amazon is the biggest bet here: its capex is equivalent to approximately 7.63% of its current market capitalization, followed by Microsoft, with 6.67%. Further behind appears Alphabet, with around 4.49%, and Meta, with around 3.04%; In contrast, Apple, which remains the most valuable company in the world, has a capex of only 0.29% of its market value. Wall Street rules. The decisions of these companies seem to be greatly influenced by the behavior of the stock markets. The presentation of financial results and short-term forecasts has caused a kind of contagious effect: if we do not invest a fortune in data centers, shareholders are going to punish us a lot, Big Tech seem to have said with those colossal figures. The big beneficiary is NVIDIA. Meanwhile, it is likely that the big beneficiary of these colossal investments will be NVIDIA, which will be the one that will receive a good part of that money if everything continues the current trend. There will undoubtedly be other beneficiaries in this area, but NVIDIA’s Capex is comparatively ridiculous, both with respect to those companies and compared to its current market capitalization ($4.75 billion). Apple is going at a different pace with AI. The Cupertino firm clearly seems to have a very different strategy than its rivals in this segment. Google and Apple subscribed a collaboration for which the next generation of its assistant that will be based on Gemini models and Google cloud technology to power future Apple Intelligence featuresincluding a more personalized Siri. The final deployment came at WWDC 2026: Apple presented “Siri AI”, a remake of the assistant integrated with its Apple Intelligence system developed in collaboration with Google’s Gemini models. The feeling, even internally, is that at Apple they are clear followers and that is not going to change at the moment. A version of this article was published in February 2025. Image | Unsplash (Bangyu Wang) In Xataka | Is Tim Cook the Ballmer of Apple and is Nadella the Jobs of Microsoft?

a data center turned neighborhood life into a nightmare

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For years, data centers remained out of our sight, although much of what we do on the Internet depends on them. In Dowagiac, a city in southwest Michigan, that infrastructure has become impossible to ignore: several residents say that a facility dedicated to cryptocurrency mining and currently in the process of reconversion It has been emitting a high-pitched hum 24 hours a day since 2024. Now, as the company prepares the leap into computing for artificial intelligence and advanced robotics, the conflict shows the extent to which a digital installation can transform the daily lives of those who live around it. unbearable noise. The story focuses on Louise Avenue, a dead-end street where Lindy Valenzuela and her husband and wife Marjorie and Billy Finn live right across the street from the compound, owned by Alliance Cloud Services LLC, a subsidiary of Hyperscale Data. According to what they told the American network WXYZfor decades on the other side there was an industrial building hidden behind a row of pine trees, integrated into the daily landscape of the neighborhood. Neighbors date the change to 2018, when the trees disappeared and a loading dock was installed. Around 2021, a cryptocurrency mining operation began there and, three years later, the operation of the place began to feel different. inside the houses. Valenzuela described the sound with a very specific comparison: “It sounds like having a vacuum cleaner in your living room (…) when the filter is clogged, so it makes a high-pitched whistle. And they left it on and left.” Its consequences appear in everyday gestures that were previously normal. The Finns say they can no longer open the windows like they used to, while Valenzuela says that staying outside for a few minutes on hot days can end up giving them a headache. From complaints to the courts. The conflict ceased to be solely a neighborhood conflict in March 2026, when Dowagiac passed its first industrial noise ordinance. The standard sets a maximum of 65 dB during the day and 55 dB at night, and the municipal official assured that the city had already sanctioned Hyperscale Data for failing to comply. The company, however, questions both the measurements and the method used. In parallel, Valenzuela appears as a plaintiff in a class action that accuses the operator of negligence and substantially interfering with the use and enjoyment of the homes. The turn towards AI: Hyperscale Data has put figures to the transformation announced for the venue. Its CEO, William Horne, explained during an extraordinary meeting of the municipal council that the company plans to invest $100 million to expand computing for artificial intelligence and advanced robotics, while abandoning cryptocurrency mining. It has also acquired adjacent land that it intends to use as a natural separation strip to reduce the sound that reaches the homes. For now, however, local authorities say they have not received any permit requests for this expansion. The answers. Among the responses offered by Hyperscale Data is the progressive shutdown of mining machinery, which the company hopes to complete over the next three months. The CEO went further and stated that they would buy the homes of those who still could not enjoy them. For those affected, this alternative does not resolve what these homes represent. For example, the Finn house has been in the family for almost 100 years and there they maintain their friendships and a support network that also helps Marjorie, diagnosed with Parkinson’s. The case. What is happening in Dowagiac shows how a computer infrastructure can become very physical when it is installed next to homes and operates continuously. Data centers support services that we use every day. This expansion can provide investment and employment, although it can also increase the demand for electricity and water, the occupation of land and, in certain cases, the noise endured by the environment. Images | Brett Sayles In Xataka | The Chinese AI startup that launched the amazing GLM-5.2 model has just reached another milestone: creating its own data center

Nvidia is willing to guarantee $250 billion for OpenAI to have its own data center, according to WSJ

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Nvidia is considering becoming the main financial driver of one of the largest AI infrastructure projects to date. And according to has advanced The Wall Street Journal, Jensen Huang’s company is negotiating to offer a guarantee of about $250 billion so that OpenAI can rent a colossal data center campus in Ohio, USA. All, without the agreement being closed yet. What exactly is the agreement about?. Nvidia’s endorsement would not be direct money for OpenAI, but rather a financial guarantee. According to the media, it would help those responsible for ChatGPT can lease a 10-gigawatt project that SoftBank’s energy subsidiary, SB Energy, is building in southern Ohio. With the backing of Nvidia, this project could obtain debt financing on better terms, something especially relevant because OpenAI, being a private company that has not yet made a profit, does not have sufficient credit rating to be able to invest in this type of project on its own. Why is such a guarantee necessary?. Without the backing of a creditworthy partner, it would be much more expensive for SoftBank to borrow the money needed to build such infrastructure. Just like share WSJ, by putting its signature as a guarantee, Nvidia reduces the risk that lenders assume and makes the operation cheaper. In the jargon of the sector this is called “credit wrapper”, and it is not the first time it has happened. In fact, Google has endorsed Anthropic data centers before, in part to boost sales of its own AI chips, according to collect the same medium. Figures that give vertigo. The entire project, also counting the chips that will go inside the facilities, could exceed $500 billion, which would make it the largest data center announced to date. The guarantee of 250,000 million would cover the rent and construction debt, but not the semiconductors. For this, Nvidia is separately negotiating another financing for the purchase of chips by OpenAI, which could reach an additional $350 billion, according to share from WSJ. The role of the Government of USA. The project’s electricity is under government control and is financed, in part, thanks to a recent trade agreement with Japan, which committed to invest $33 billion in a natural gas plant in the same area, as remember the WSJ. Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick is directly involved in deciding who has access to that energy. The chosen site is, in addition, a former uranium enrichment center already closed, about 80 kilometers south of Columbus, which would allow us to avoid a good part of the problems of permits and opposition from residents around the area that other similar projects in the country suffer. She is not the only one interested. OpenAI has been in talks for weeks to take over that space and it is, according to the WSJ, the candidate that has shown the most interest. But she’s not alone, as Anthropic, Microsoft and Google have also spoken to Lutnick about the same issue in recent weeks. Getting energy power has become the big bottleneck for all companies training large-scale AI models. What does each party gain?. For OpenAI, this agreement would represent a change of model, as it would be its first data center as a direct tenant, a step towards controlling part of its own infrastructure instead of depending exclusively on renting capacity from Microsoft, Amazon and Oracle, as it does now. The company has already raised its computing spending forecast until 2030 to $750 billion, compared to the $600 billion it managed at the beginning of the year. For Nvidia, with a market value close to $5 billion, endorsing these types of projects ensures future demand for its chips for years. The shadow of circular financing. This type of operation, in which large technology companies finance infrastructure that later generates business for themselves, worries a large part of the market. Gary Tan, portfolio manager at Allspring Global Investments, counted to Bloomberg that “although Nvidia’s investments and partnerships bolster confidence in long-term AI builds, investors remain concerned about circular financing.” Nvidia itself has warned in its latest annual report that these types of agreements could reduce its short-term liquidity and increase its exposure to the credit risk of its clients. And now what. Negotiations are still in an early phase and conditions could change or even break before anything is signed, according to quote from Bloomberg. The first phase of the project, with about 800 operational megawatts, would not be ready until 2028. So it seems that we will have to wait to find out if it ends up materializing and how exactly it does so. Cover image | Steve Juvetson, NVIDIA In Xataka | “The world doesn’t realize how much the AI ​​industry depends on scientists in China” Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia

create your own data center

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Z.AI has been the protagonist of big headlines in recent weeks, especially after the launch of its very powerful GLM 5.2 language model. Formerly known as Zhipu, the company has now just finished building a massive 1 gigawatt data center that, according to they count from Bloomberg, it will work exclusively with semiconductors made in China. To put it in context, it would be the most ambitious bet yet by a Chinese technology startup to completely dispense with Nvidia. They can’t buy Nvidia chips. Since January 2025, Z.AI has been on the US Department of Commerce’s entity list, which prevents it from legally purchasing Nvidia chips. The most curious thing of all is that this veto, far from stopping it, has pushed it to build all its future infrastructure relying only on national suppliers, according to they explained from Bloomberg. But it is not at all strange, since it is a movement that fits with Beijing’s strategy of reducing its technological dependence on Washington in the midst of the AI ​​race. In detail. As shared by the media, the data center has already begun to operate partially and is designed to train and deploy the company’s family of GLM models. With a power of 1 gigawatt at full capacity, from Bloomberg they assure that the facility could consume as much electricity as about 750,000 homes need, making it one of the largest data centers ever built by a Chinese artificial intelligence startup. For now, the company has installed at least 10,000 chips from China there, although there is no information on what proportion of the total planned capacity that figure represents. Between the lines. Although the media does not detail which company provides the chips, everything points to Huawei. Z.AI already presented its GLM-5.2 model in June, trained entirely with Huawei Ascend accelerators and without resorting to Nvidia hardware. The model also came out ahead of the rest in rankings of open source models such as Design Arena. The problem is that, according to they claim Bloomberg, Chinese chips like the Ascend still perform worse per watt than Nvidia’s current Blackwell, which means that one gigawatt of Chinese power is not equivalent, in practice, to the same computing power as one gigawatt consumed with Nvidia hardware. Added to this is a manufacturing bottleneck. From Tom’s Hardware they point out that SMIC’s most advanced and stable process (equivalent to a 7-nanometer node) is already operating at over 93% of its capacity, and that the shortage of domestically produced HBM memory limits how many accelerators Huawei, which last year shipped around 812,000 AI chips, can assemble. Bloomberg pointed In addition, citing a previous report, Huawei plans to manufacture about 1.6 million Ascend cores in 2026, enough for about 600,000 chips of its flagship model, the 910C, while Cambricon, another of Nvidia’s major Chinese rivals, has set a goal of half a million accelerators this year. In short: China can build data centers faster than it can make the chips needed to fill them. sweet moment. The Z.AI thing comes at the height of the pulse among Chinese AI startups. Its great rival, Moonshot, had to suspend new subscriptions to its platform last Sunday to prioritize the computing capacity of its current users, after the launch of his amazing Kimi K3 modelaccording to explained the company itself on social networks. Z.AI, for its part, is going through a good financial moment. And it is that according to sources consulted by Bloombergthe company is on track to reach $1 billion in annual recurring revenue after meeting its 2026 sales target this month, and has recently bolstered its capital with an IPO in Hong Kong and a subsequent expansion. The company’s shares have closed with an increase of 37% this Tuesdaycoinciding with the news of the new data center. A more ambitious plan. The Z.AI case is part of a much broader plan by the Chinese Government. And Beijing is preparing an investment of about 2 trillion yuan (about $295 billion) within five years to build a national network of AI data centers, with at least 80% of the technology coming from Chinese suppliers, according to they count from Tom’s Hardware. And in that plan, Z.AI, Moonshot, and the rest of the AI ​​startups that are beginning to deploy their weapons are included. Cover image | Z.AI and İsmail Enes Ayhan In Xataka | ASML sells the most important machines in the chip industry. Now everything indicates that they will be more expensive

It’s not that a Meta data center consumes too much or too little water. It is contaminating it

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AI is quite unpopular among American citizens. According to a recent survey, the majority believe that it will have a negative impact on society. There is something in particular that has earned the rejection of a large part of the population: data centersand the truth is that they have no shortage of reasons. They pollute the airthey make raise the electricity bill and now they also contaminate the water with potentially deadly bacteria. what has happened. They count in Futurism that the authorities of Cheyenne, Wyoming, have prohibited all data centers from discharging any type of waste into the drinking water network. The reason is that Goat Systems LLC, a Meta contractor that is participating in the construction of a new data center, discharged water contaminated with Cupriavidus gilardii to the public sewage, a rare and very dangerous bacteria, especially for immunosuppressed people. The investigation. It’s not that anyone was monitoring the water quality at this particular data center, but rather that the bacteria was detected incidentally during routine testing for fecal contamination. “It’s not something we normally look at,” Frank Strong, head of the Cheyenne water agency’s engineering division, told local Wyoming News. The trail led them to the data center that Meta is building in the city, although Strong admits that they still do not know the exact origin of the pathogen within the facility. Consequences. As soon as the origin was determined, the authorities closed the facilities and stopped the discharge immediately. Additionally, as we said, they are revoking permissions so that other data centers can do the same. This means that they will not be able to do the process known as fill and flushwhereby they fill their cooling systems with water and then purge them before startup. Cupriavidus gilardii. It is an environmental bacteria that is found naturally in the soil. According to a study published in March of this year, is considered a opportunistic pathogen which rarely infects humans, but if it does it can cause death. To date, seven cases of death caused by Cupriavidus gilardii have been known and, at the moment, none have been recorded related to the spill from this data center. Meta’s response. In a public statement, a Meta spokesperson recalled that the bacteria had been found in wastewater, not public drinking water, and stated that it “immediately stopped discharging industrial wastewater and began transporting it outside the facilities.” However, the sewage system where the bacteria was located goes to a plant where wastewater is treated and then reused in public spaces such as parks, hence the authorities’ ban. What is clear is that the popularity of data centers in the US does not seem to be improving anytime soon. Image | Xataka with Magnific In Xataka | We already know how much water Amazon consumes in its data centers. We have good and bad news

In 1999, a farmer donated his land for a children’s playground. Now the city council has sold them for millions for a data center

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There are times when a good deed turns against you. Or against an entire town. In 1999, a Texan farmer named Charles Bland decided it was time to give something back to his town, a small town called Taylor. It occurred to him to donate about 35 hectares of his land to the city of 15,000 inhabitants with one condition: The city council had to use those lands to create a public park. To formalize the transaction, the city paid a symbolic amount of $10 to the farmer. 27 years later, the accounts come out in favor of the city council: it has sold part of the property not to create the promised park, but for a data center from the Blueprint company. The operation? one of 10 million dollars. And the neighbors were quick to light the torches. An offer that could not be refused This story is one of the most bizarre that we have seen in this matter of relationship between cities and data centers. The middle 404 has echoed the situation and the anger that is being aroused by both Bland’s initial objective and the fate of the land and, above all, the vague explanations of the city council is logical. The farmer initially donated his land to the Texas Parks Foundation, a nonprofit organization, with the goal of holding it in trust for future use exclusively as a playground. This is what appears in the documents and in the land deed, but there is a problem: in the following years, the property changed hands. The Parks Foundation gave it to a different nonprofit called the Williamson County Parks Foundation in 2003, but a month later, it gave it to the city itself. In 2008, the land changed hands again after a $15,000 sale to the Taylor Economic Development Corporation (TEDC). According to your page government, it is a non-profit corporation funded by the City of Taylor and, although it is a separate entity, it is the city council that appoints the five members of a Board that change terms every three years. Is this important? Well yes, since as 404 points out, it was this TEDC that, last year, sold part of the plot to Blueprinta company that plans to build a data center next to the town for those aforementioned 10 million euros. For a non-profit, the business has been successful. When they found out about both the sale and the plans to build a data center, the neighbors took to the streets to protest. Not only was the intention of that farmer who gave his land to the city with the sole interest of children having a place to play being violated, but an installation was going to be built that heats the air and that increase the electricity bill for the neighbors. Because of this, the TEDC has published a document in which he explains what is going to be done and what the city is going to get out of all this. They state that Blueprint’s data center will be used “for a wide variety of purposes including data storage, website hosting and artificial intelligence processing” in a facility that will have a total investment of 1,000 million dollars both to construct the main buildings as well as an electricity substation, backup generators and a closed-loop heat cooling system. It’s… too close to the city In a very brief way, The document addresses the complaints and concerns of neighbors referring to a report that ensures that the facilities will comply with everything necessary in terms of emissions and impact on air quality, noise pollution, light pollution, fire risk and water consumption. Always, of course, stating that the risk and consumption is minimal and that everything will go in the best possible way. Yes, the project will be connected to the electrical network for power supply. They expose that there is no way to go back and that, basically, that is what it is. Doesn’t anyone think about the children? The City Council does There will be no park, but it will be a great benefit for the city. As we see in Straight to the Palatethe facility will not occupy the 35 hectares donated by the family, but 21 hectares. The other 14 continue to belong to the city and the intention is to build a barrier to limit the impact that this data center may have on the neighbors. In addition, and as detailed in the aforementioned document, “the City expects to receive up to 30 million in total additional income that can be used to reduce property taxes and invest in streets, sidewalks, parks and other services”. With more conditionals on the list, they say that “the school district projects up to $20 million that could be used to improve facilities, increase teacher salaries and provide a better education for our students.” The truth is that the justification could well come from an episode of ‘The Simpsons’, but if we pay attention to that phrase that points out that, no matter what happens, the decision is irrevocable, the options for the neighbors do not seem very hopeful. The United States is currently experiencing two speeds in this artificial intelligence infrastructure. On the one hand, Big Tech raising monumental data centers. On the other hand, the people and political parties (both Republican and Democrat) that are rising in some states against these facilities. Studies are already appearing that leave aside tabout water consumption (minor one that was talked about a few months ago) as energy consumption (this one is tremendous) to point to the havoc on the environment what these “giant computers” cause. But hey, in the end Taylor won’t have a new park, but he will have a few million that could be used to make a park next to a giant radiator. In Xataka | AI has caused the collapse of even a non-AI industry: gas turbines

France has been determined to rob Spain of its position as a data center power in Europe

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The French country has hit the table in its ambition to become a technological benchmark in Europe. He agreement reached between Emmanuel Macron and Masayoshi Son (CEO of SoftBank) aims to deploy up to 5 GW of computing capacity for AI data centers in northern France. This movement competes with all the projects that are underway in Spain, one of the countries that until now had attracted the greatest interest from hyperscalers. The problem is that neither France nor Spain will gain much from these initiatives. Nuclear counterattack. France has taken advantage your energy network —with a clear prominence of its nuclear power plants— to attract AI supercomputing projects. The SoftBank project will start in the Hauts-de-France region with an initial phase of 45 billion euros to build data centers in regions such as Dunkirk. In this first phase we want to achieve that the total capacity rise to 3.1 GW in 2031followed by a second phase that could reach 5 GW. Spain, data center paradise. Faced with this French movement, Spain has been closing agreements in that same area for months. It totals more than 22,000 million euros in recently announced projects. Giants like AWS (15.7 billion in Aragon), Microsoft (more than 7,000 million) and Blackstone have chosen our country to create these data centers. The Spanish advantage is its renewable energy productionwhich has attracted that type of investment. The harsh reality: Europe (probably) loses. Although both this announcement and those made in Spain are very striking, the reality for the Old Continent is quite stark. The data centers in Spain are not Spanish, and those in France are not French either. Europe is becoming the powerhouse for foreign multinationals that invest here because it suits them strategically. Energy resources are great for Microsoft, Amazon, Meta or Softbank, but the real benefit of this computing does not remain in Europe. The accounts. There is a clear difference between the strategies of Spain and France. Spanish soil is filled with hyperscalers like AWS or Microsoft that build, operate their own clouds and then control the flow completely. In the case of France, the initiative depends on a Japanese conglomerate allied with sovereign funds from the Middle East. SoftBank operates here more like a real estate developer– Create the data center and then rent it to third parties. Source: FT. Sovereignty, little. Emmanuel Macron and Pedro Sánchez can sell the message that these projects promote this ambition to have sovereign AI. The problem is that these data centers are simply delegations of big technology companies taking advantage of the advantages offered by their European partners. There may be options in the French project for the country to boost its AI companies —Mistral is the clear example—, but the truth is that these movements do little to help this objective of avoiding the independence of foreign technology companies. Rather they make the situation worse. The other European rivals. Europe’s traditional technology markets, grouped under the acronym FLAP-D (Frankfurt, London, Amsterdam, Paris and Dublin) are giving way to projects in other countries like France or Spain. There are also other protagonists in this new map of decentralized infrastructures: the Nordic countries are also interesting for their cold climates, ideal for helping to cool these centers. The real bottleneck. Beyond the billions of euros that are on the table, the big battle in the coming years will be access to hardware components, especially now that the memory crisis has made everything significantly more expensive. Demand far exceeds supply and it does not seem that this imbalance will be resolved soon, so all of these initiatives could suffer delays and changes in their final costs. In Xataka | Mistral does not generate hype, it is a discreet AI, it does not boost the shares of any company, but it already makes more money than Grok

Airbus had a single center in the world to convert commercial aircraft into military tankers. Now another one will open in Seville

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Airbus has chosen Seville to install its second global conversion center for the A330 MRTT, the best-selling tanker and military transport aircraft on the market outside the United States. The San Pablo plant will thus become the twin of the Getafe plant, until now the only one in the world capable of transforming A330 commercial aircraft into its multirole military version. We made the announcement during the opening of the ADM Sevilla 2026 fair and the facilities are expected to be operational at the end of 2027. Why it matters. The A330 MRTT is experiencing a sweet moment, as it accumulates some 91 orders from 19 countries and controls 90% of the world market share, excluding the United States. The war in ukrainethe escalation of military spending in Europe and the growing need for tanker aircraft to extend the air forces’ operating margin have triggered demand for a model that until now was assembled at a rate limited by its single-plant capacity. Add Seville will allow you to go from five to seven annual conversions and thus take some work off the Getafe plant. In detail. The conversion process is usually a rather complex task for European aerospace engineering. Civilian A330s leave the Toulouse chain and they are transferred to the conversion center, where for about nine months military systems, in-flight refueling equipment, specific avionics, communications and interior configurations adapted to each client are integrated, until they are ready for aerial refueling missions, troop transport, strategic cargo or medical evacuations. The plant in Seville will also assume maintenance, repair and modernization (MRO) tasks for aircraft already in service. Airbus will take advantage of the current hangars in San Pablo and optimize them to work with two aircraft at a time, imitating Getafe’s way of workingwhere usually one is converted while the other receives maintenance tasks. Figures. The new line will generate around 200 direct jobswhich will be added to the 2,000 professionals already working in São Paulo, and about 600 additional positions in the auxiliary industry. In Andalusia, Airbus is responsible for around 3,500 people between the San Pablo, Tablada (Seville) and Cádiz plants, and more than 14,000 throughout Spain. Why Seville. The president of Airbus in Spain, Francisco Javier Sánchez Segura, pointed ABC that the reasons were based above all on the technical knowledge accumulated in the A400M and C295 programs, the existing infrastructure (San Pablo is the only Airbus factory with two final assembly lines) and the operational proximity with Getafe, which will act as strategic coordinator of the entire program. A technological leap. Until now, Airbus Defense and Space’s activity in Seville revolved around the assembly and maintenance of the A400M and the C295, both military transport aircraft. Sanchez Segura underlined The Seville center will replicate the cutting-edge technologies developed in Getafe, including the intensive use of augmented reality applied to the assembly and inspection of systems. Andalusia, in the focus of aviation. For the Junta de Andalucía, the announcement fits into its strategy to place the community in one of the three most important European points, along with Toulouse and Hamburg. The acting Minister of Industry, Jorge Paradela, recalled that the region already has several important investments, such as the arrival of the Swiss company Pilatus to manufacture private and military training aircraft, and the Ryanair projectvalued at 500 million euros, to internalize the repair of aeronautical engines in Andalusia, with 600 direct jobs planned. The acting Minister of Economy, Carolina España, rated the Airbus announcement is “magnificent news”, also highlighting that exports from the Andalusian aerospace sector have grown by 86% so far in 2026. The other side. The ADM Seville fair, where the advertisement was presented, also attracted protests. The STOP Arms Fair Platform, which brings together social groups, unions, environmentalists and pacifists, gathered at the gates of FIBES to denounce “the institutional support” for the defense industry and the presence of companies that, according to these organizations, have links to human rights violations in armed conflicts such as the one in Gaza. What’s coming now. Airbus has about two years of works, personnel training and technological adaptation ahead before San Pablo delivers its first converted aircraft. If the planned pace is met, Seville and Getafe will end up operating in a coordinated manner to satisfy a larger customer base in a context that does not seem to be going to let up. According to Sánchez SeguraAerópolis depends on around 70% of Airbus’ workload, and this for the Seville plant means consolidating in a field that until now was foreign to it. Cover image | Air and Space Army In Xataka | The war in Iran is doing something that not even Ryanair imagined: making 20 euro flights a relic of the past

Microsoft wanted to create a mega data center in Kenya. To function, half the country had to live without electricity

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In May 2024 Microsoft announced what seemed like a historic agreement for Kenya’s technological development. The goal: create a gigantic data center that would be powered by geothermal energy. This center was going to be created in the Olkaria region, but the Kenyan president, William Ruto, has been blunt with Microsoft’s energy claims: to power the total requested 1 GW capacity, the country “would have to shut down half the nation.” too fair. Kenya has an electrical capacity installed capacity of between 3 and 3.2 GW, with peak demand that already reaches 2.44 GW. Microsoft’s project would consume approximately a third of the country’s total capacity. Even the first phase, which requires a capacity of 100 MW, would take a huge bite out of the production of the Olkaria geothermal complex, which generates about 950 GW in total. Kenya seems to be clear that sacrificing domestic consumption was not worth it when most of the project’s profitability will end up in the hands of a large foreign technology company. Financial disagreement. In addition to the energy problems, the negotiations have ended up getting stuck in the economic field. According to sources close to the process cited in BloombergMicrosoft and the investment firm G42 have reportedly asked the Kenyan government for a financial commitment. Specifically, payment for a certain amount of capacity each year, something with which the Kenyan leaders did not fully agree. The project has not been canceled. John Tanui, head of Kenya’s Ministry of Information, explained that his country is still in negotiations with Microsoft and G42, and that the agreement “has not failed or been abandoned. The scale of the data center they needed requires some structuring,” and that includes solving both the energy and economic problems. A project with a lot of geopolitics behind it. This project was not only a technological milestone for Microsoft and Africa, but also a diplomatic one. It is part of a $1.5 billion deal between Microsoft and Abu Dhabi-based G42, which was designed to counter potential deals on this continent with China. In fact, as a condition for the G42 agreement had to divest its Chinese assets and remove Huawei equipment from their systems. While the project is on hold, however, the Chinese company continues to expand in this region and has recently launched new broadband services over fiber with the largest Kenyan operator, Safaricom. Bottlenecks everywhere. The case of Kenya is not the only one that is stopping Microsoft’s plans. The company has announced a capex of 190 billion dollars by 2026 that will be invested in data centers, and the company is adding approximately 1 GW of computing capacity each quarter globally. However, about half of the data centers planned in the US this year have been canceled or delayed due to the shortage of electrical infrastructure. Image | Microsoft In Xataka | In 2024, Big Tech spent absurd amounts of money on AI. In 2025, they managed to spend 77% more

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