Dive Brief:
- At a pivotal time for the data center industry, hyperscaler Meta will now invest more than $50 billion in its data center and the surrounding area in Richland Parish, Louisiana, according to a Monday announcement.
- The parent company of Facebook and Instagram said the money represents one of the largest artificial intelligence infrastructure investments in the world.
- The sum also signals significant growth. In 2024, Meta announced plans to invest $10 billion in the project’s development and contracted builders Turner Construction, DPR Construction and Mortenson to build the facility. It then upped that number to $27 billion in October, according to CNBC.
Dive Insight:
With the expansion, the new data center facility will reach nearly 10 million square feet and 5 gigawatts of IT capacity, making it the largest in Meta’s global fleet and one of the largest data centers ever built, per Louisiana Economic Development. The project broke ground in December 2024.
Turner and Mortenson are the general contractors for the expansion, while DPR is building the first part of the project, Ashley Settle, business and infrastructure communications manager for Meta, told Construction Dive via email. Meta worked with all three firms in planning the expansion, she said, which was “based on business needs.”
In Louisiana, Meta will pay the full costs of the energy, water and related infrastructure the data center will use, per the company’s announcement. It flagged an agreement with utility provider Entergy Louisiana, under which Meta will fund seven new natural gas-fueled generating plants, approximately 240 miles of new 500 kV transmission lines, battery energy storage across three locations and other improvements.
The project will support 7,500 construction jobs at peak construction, per LED. Louisiana is also one of four pilot locations for Meta’s $115 million America’s Workforce Academy, which will provide skilled trades training and job opportunities on data center projects.
“In just two years, we’ve secured more than $150 billion in new investment by creating an environment where companies can move quickly and build at scale,” said Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry in the LED announcement.
Data center construction has been the building industry’s darling in 2026, representing the biggest gains in nearly all measurable metrics. That strength is offset by the rest of the industry, which has struggled to keep pace.
But community pushback against the massive builds has also been growing at a rapid pace. Meta’s announcement came one day before New York State Gov. Kathy Hochul issued a statewide moratorium on environmental permits for data centers in the Empire State, a first in the U.S. Hochul, who signed the executive order Tuesday, emphasized the strain that New Yorkers felt in utility bills brought on by data centers.
