PORTS-Pike Technology Campus

Timeline from the record

Newest first. Record entries come from the filings and reports the registry cites. Coverage entries are headlines from publisher feeds we monitor daily, linked to the outlet; last checked September 14, 2026.

1. March 20, 2026

   Under construction
   Groundbreaking 2026-03-20 on the former Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant site; 10 GW gross power load, 9.2 GW of new natural gas generation. Source: Construction Review Online

Opposition and litigation at this site

Partly. Both documented support and documented opposition to PORTS-Pike Technology Campus in Piketon, Pike County, Ohio appear in the record, with no clear majority position. Documented local support alongside contamination-legacy distrust.

How the community has taken it

Reception is a sourced signal, not an editorial judgment: mixed reception means documented support and documented opposition both exist with no clear majority position on record.

Documented local support alongside contamination-legacy distrust. Support: State Sen. Shane Wilkin - "It’s just going to be a generational change for this area"; SODI executive director Steve Shepherd called it "a model for the country"; the Scioto Valley-Piketon Area Council of Governments chair framed it as moving contaminated residential land to industrial use. Concern: a neighbouring farmer with contaminated property ("This is the most contaminated place around here"), and Conserve Ohio on water, transmission and the precedent of siting hyperscale projects on legacy DOE land. TRANSMISSION: the lines serving the campus are being sited by the utility, AEP Ohio Transmission Company, not by the data center operator; the customer has committed to pay for them. Three corridors: Baku-Gavin 765 kV (Pike, Jackson, Gallia; OPSB Case 26-0426-EL-BTX, application filed 2026-07-24 and found complete 2026-08-28, local public hearing set for 2026-10-27 in Jackson, with an administrative law judge entry of 2026-10-21 granting an individual's petition to intervene and OPSB Staff's report of investigation filed 2026-10-22); Hanging Rock-Baku 765 kV (Pike, Scioto, Lawrence; AEP plans to file as 26-0870-EL-BTX); and an earlier-stage feasibility study in Pike, Ross and Pickaway counties with no route selected. As of 2026-10-15 no appropriation (eminent domain) filing against landowners for these lines was found (as of October 2026, county court dockets had not been checked); AEP describes acquiring right-of-way with just compensation, and Ohio law has treated AEP's Ohio Power Company as authorised to appropriate property for transmission easements (Ohio Power Co. v. Burns, 2022, an unrelated Washington County line). No litigation, moratorium or public-hearing defeat found as of 2026-10-15; a statewide watchdog notes this project lacks the named opposition groups seen elsewhere in Ohio. Community money (not a public subsidy to the operator): a $40M Community Benefits Agreement from SB Energy plus an incremental $40M from OpenAI.

Source: Statehouse News Bureau

Power and water

S-1: the campus is "designed to include 8.0 GW-IT of data center capacity, representing 10 GW of gross power load expected to be supported by the PJM transmission system and new neighboring gas-fired generation facilities" - hence the energy source is recorded as a mix of sources. The 9.2 GW of gas is new build, not a reused plant; the site is the former Portsmouth uranium-enrichment complex, whose historic power came over OVEC coal-fired transmission (X-533 switchyard, de-energised 2008, decommissioned 2011). Recorded under on-site generation as dedicated captive generation, but note the S-1 calls the plants "neighboring": they sit ~5 miles south of Piketon adjacent to the DOE site, are developed by "an affiliate of SoftBank that is not our subsidiary", and SB Energy "do[es] not expect to own or operate" them. Ohio Power Siting Board case 26-0746-EL-BGN (applicant Portsmouth Gas DevCo, LLC) covers only a first tranche of "up to 2 gigawatts"; as of October 2026 OPSB's case-tracking data lists 1,770 MW in 48 units on 775 acres for that case, its application took effect 2026-10-15, a local public hearing is set for 2026-12-10 in Piketon and the evidentiary hearing for 2027-01-06, and at least nine petitions for leave to intervene were filed on 2026-10-13 and 2026-10-14 (the docket entry titles do not state their positions); a second case by the same applicant, 26-1070-EL-BGN, was opened 2026-10-15 and lists 5,000 MW with no application date; AEP Ohio transmission is separate from the generation case: AEP's Piketon Area Improvements hub lists the Baku-Gavin 765 kV line (OPSB 26-0426-EL-BTX), a planned Hanging Rock-Baku 765 kV line (26-0870-EL-BTX), the Baku 765 kV and Monza 345 kV stations, and two Baku extension lines (26-0866/0867/0868/0869-EL-BLN); an earlier description cited "four substations". AEP grid capex is stated as $4.2B by DOE and ~$5.1B in the S-1, unreconciled. CAUTION: the project site states the gas generation "will be owned by the U.S. Government", but the S-1 says "no binding agreement has been executed between us or any of our affiliates and any governmental entity with respect to the funding, construction, ownership or operation of the generation facilities" - do not assert federal ownership. Only ~0.8 GW of gross load has contracted utility service so far.

Notes on the record

Officially "PORTS-Pike Technology Campus"; formerly tracked under the pre-announcement Ohio entity New Day Data Centers LLC, a name that appears nowhere in the SEC S-1 or SB Energy’s own announcements. Developer/operator is SB Energy (SoftBank-controlled); the DOE lease was signed 2026-02-26 by its subsidiary Pike County Portsmouth DC LLC. Capacity: three distinct figures: 8.0 GW-IT of contracted compute (8,024 MW-IT; NVIDIA guarantees the initial 4.25 GW-IT with an option on the remaining 3.78 GW-IT), 10 GW of gross power load (the planned capacity recorded here), and 9.2 GW of new gas generation. Offtake: on 2026-08-17 SB Energy subsidiaries signed 17 twenty-year triple-net leases with OpenAI, with rent commencement conditioned on interconnection and generation being available; NVIDIA provided a residual-value guaranty capped at $105B and separately bought $1.5B of non-voting stock. Land: the land area is not recorded - the DOE lease covers 189 acres (Batch 1) on which "one data center building is expected to be constructed", while the S-1 places the buildings "across several thousand acres of private property"; the widely-cited 3,700/3,777 acres is the whole federal reservation, which also hosts the separately tracked Oklo Aurora project, Centrus and the DUF6 plant. Investment: no investment figure is recorded - $10B (DOE, March) and $30-40B (project site) describe the same ~800 MW first phase and cannot both be right, the $67.2B total appears only as one trade outlet’s unattributed rollup, and the S-1 states no total capex. Subsidies: none awarded - the Ohio Tax Credit Authority minutes record no award, no JobsOhio award was found as of September 2026, and Ohio paused new data-centre tax exemptions in May 2026; a county PILOT is under negotiation because the leased federal land yields no property tax. Status: early civil works began after the 2026-03-20 groundbreaking, though the S-1 lists construction as not started, with first capacity in 2028 and full buildout 2032. Distinct from the Oklo Aurora Powerhouse on the same broader site.

Other sites within 30 miles

Distances are between recorded coordinates, many of which are a city or county centroid, so treat them as approximate. Cumulative load on one utility and one aquifer is the question a planning commission rarely asks.

• Aligned HPC Campus at Former Pixelle Paper Mill (Chillicothe) · Chillicothe · Aligned19 mi · Proposed

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