Iowa · Speed to power
The headlines say Iowa has four times more committed data center capacity than power to serve it. The number is real, and most of that commitment is a press release. The projects that actually energize belong to the developers who already sat down with the utility, the county, and the landowner. Speed to power is a people business. We know the people.
Google, Meta, Microsoft, and Apple campuses, all 100 MW or larger.
Ten campuses in permitting or construction. A pipeline, not a fact on the ground.
Nationally, in one quarter. Announced capacity is a press release; permitting and a county vote decide what becomes a substation.
For a greenfield site at the back of the queue. Not the clock for an already energized position.
Iowa capacity figures: Clean Energy Districts of Iowa data center tracker, which lists every campus of 100 MW or larger by facility, utility, and county. Cancellation count: national, Q1 2026.
Headline vs. reality
Every developer reads the same queue. What separates the projects that energize is who has already sat down with the utility, the county, and the landowner.
In aggregate, close to true. In detail, wrong. Capacity spoken for in one utility territory is often open in the next one over.
What we do about it
We know which meters still have room, because we asked the people who run them long before we needed the answer.
Announced capacity is a press release. Iowa carries projects that will not clear permitting, a water study, or a county vote.
What we do about it
The projects that energize arrive with community consent already in hand. Ours do, because we live in these counties.
For a cold start, yes. That is a different clock from capacity already energized, already permitted, and sized for the load.
What we do about it
Containerized capacity on an existing interconnection energizes in months. With studies complete and agreements signed, MISO can approve a large load in as little as 120 days.
Few operators can tell you which of those three you are actually facing. That answer does not come out of a queue report. It comes from the people who have been in the room.
Track record
The first goal Simple Mining set was five megawatts in five years. We operate thirty times that.
2021
The original goal
The first ask we ever took to a utility.
2026
Operational today
Thirty times that plan, across three Iowa data centers.
2031
Operational capacity
Our ten-year goal. 500+ MW is already in development.
How we get there
Amazon built warehouses and compute for retail; that infrastructure became AWS. Our sites, substations, and crews already exist.
The business that built the company, still growing.
The same sites, power positions, and crews, taking on AI workloads. Anchor leases contracted before speculative.
Behind-the-meter projects that put generation next to the load instead of queuing for someone else's.
Start here
Give us the megawatts, the rack density, and the month you need to be live. We will come back with the sites that can hold it and the interconnection status of each. Not a queue position. An answer.