Google launches largest solar+battery project, 40 miles from xAI's unpermitted gas plant

Google has announced its largest solar power and battery storage purchase to date — the Steel River Energy Center in Arkansas, developed alongside Cypress Creek Energy. The first two phases will add 1 gigawatt of solar capacity and 1.9 gigawatt-hours of battery storage, sufficient to supply roughly 6% of Arkansas's peak electricity demand. Cypress Creek has secured $3.5 billion in financing for these phases. A third and final phase, scheduled to connect to the grid in 2029, will bring total capacity to approximately 1.8 GW of solar and 2.9 GWh of battery storage — making it the largest solar facility in the United States. Electricity will flow directly to the grid, offsetting demand from Google's data centers and supporting its goal of matching electricity use with clean energy on an hourly basis. The project sits roughly 30 miles north of Memphis, Tennessee — and about 40 miles north of xAI's Colossus data center complex in Mississippi, where xAI is operating nearly 60 natural gas turbines without federal clean air permits, according to Reuters. Pollution from xAI's plant is reportedly affecting predominantly Black neighborhoods. Elon Musk recently purchased APR Energy, a modular natural gas plant developer, signaling continued reliance on fossil fuels. Google has invested in one natural gas project — a 933 MW plant in West Texas with Crusoe — but describes this as an anomaly in an otherwise renewables-focused strategy.