Billionaires want data centers everywhere, including space

Tech billionaires person been obsessed pinch abstraction for a long time. Now, arsenic the largest AI companies title to build more information centers successful a frenzied pursuit of profitability, abstraction is looking little for illustration a pet task and much for illustration a commercialized opportunity. In 2025 alone, six proposals for elephantine AI information centers needing aggregate gigawatts of powerfulness — a capacity only rumored of successful 2024 — person been announced. Earthlings are catching connected to the truth that power-hungry information centers return up onshore and water, while providing fewer jobs, excessively overmuch pollution, and rising energy costs.

Hence the thought to put the information centers successful orbit around the Earth, not connected the Earth. Space-based information centers — successful the shape of satellites pinch star panels — are Big Tech’s latest fad and Silicon Valley’s newest investable venture. In space, they theorize, the sun’s unlimited rays could supply endless amounts of energy to powerfulness your latest AI-generated Sora video. But it’s not apt to beryllium that easy.

Yet, scientists who study abstraction stay skeptical of the idea. Astronomer Jonathan McDowell has been search each entity launched into abstraction since the precocious 1980s. He told The Verge that, unsurprisingly, it is very costly to motorboat thing into space. Many business ventures, he said, commencement from the thought that “‘space is cool, let’s do thing successful space,’ alternatively than, ‘we really request to beryllium successful abstraction to do this.’”

The main perk of orbital information centers is entree to free, limitless star powerfulness erstwhile walking astir the Earth from rod to rod successful the sun-synchronous orbit. (Musk’s Starlink satellites, successful contrast, debar the poles and instrumentality adjacent to paying customers astir the planet’s populated middle.) The centers would person to stay successful low Earth orbit astir 600 to 1,000 miles up from the crushed successful bid to pass without very ample antennas.

In November, Google laid retired plans for a sun-synchronous debased Earth orbital information halfway called Project Suncatcher, which is slated to footwear disconnected successful early 2027 pinch a motorboat of 2 prototype satellites. Ultimately, Google says location could beryllium 81 satellites, each carrying TPU chips, walking together successful an arranged cluster 1 kilometer-square successful size. Only 100 to 200 meters would abstracted each satellite. (For context, emblematic GPS and Starlink satellites move astir individually, not successful 81-unit fleets.) Whereas wires link GPUs together connected Earth, Google plans to link the TPU chips pinch inter-satellite lasers.

Some experts opportunity it would not beryllium soft sailing, however. The group of satellites would request to recreation done millions of pieces of abstraction debris, aliases “a minefield of random objects, each moving astatine 17,000 miles an hour,” Mojtaba Akhavan-Tafti, subordinate investigation intelligence of abstraction sciences and engineering astatine the University of Michigan, explained to The Verge. This space debris is particularly concentrated successful celebrated orbits for illustration the Sun-synchronous orbit. This is why Google’s scheme is looking, well, “a small iffy,” he said. Dodging each entity requires a mini propulsion to move retired of the way. For context, Akhavan-Tafti wrote successful a caller Fortune article that the astir 8,300 Starlink satellites made over 140,000 specified maneuvers successful conscionable the first half of 2025. Given the adjacent proximity of each outer successful Google’s plan, Akhavan-Tafti thinks that the full constellation, alternatively than each individual satellite, would request to move retired of the measurement of immoderate incoming debris. “That’s really the large challenge,” he said.

Similarly, McDowell says that a group of 81 satellites walking together conscionable 100 to 200 meters isolated would beryllium “unprecedented” — typically only 2 aliases three, possibly four, spacecraft would recreation that adjacent together. The size and closeness coming “concerning nonaccomplishment modes.” “If a thruster gets stuck, stuck on, aliases fails, and now you’ve sewage a rogue 1 successful among each the others successful this cluster of 81,” he explains.

However, Jessica Bloom, an astrophysicist connected Google’s Project Suncatcher, told The Verge that the group of 81 satellites is “illustrative,” for now, because the last number will dangle connected money and results from preliminary tests scheduled for 2027. Regardless, satellites tin move individually aliases arsenic a group to debar debris, Bloom said, and the closeness of the walking satellites is the astir caller portion of Google’s plan.

Bloom explained that the satellites will orbit astatine the aforesaid velocity comparative to each other, and “relative velocity, alternatively than proximity, is the cardinal consequence facet for harm from effect betwixt objects,” she said. “We return our work to the abstraction situation highly seriously; our attack prioritizes abstraction sustainability and compliance pinch some existent and emerging rules to minimize consequence from debris successful orbit,” Bloom said.

In summation to the bones of aged satellites, the number of caller spacecraft successful orbit has dramatically increased complete the past fewer years. There are now much than 14,000 progressive satellites, astir two-thirds of which are Starlink, arsenic tracked by McDowell. “As the number of spacecraft increases, you person to dodge much often, truthful you person to usage much fuel,” he said. This presents a information problem: More substance intends a bigger spacecraft, which is simply a bigger entity for different spacecraft to dodge, which intends it’s much apt to lend to abstraction debris.

Space information centers besides person to contend pinch the uniquely extraterrestrial problem of getting free of power successful a vacuum. Philip Johnston, CEO of Nvidia-backed startup Starcloud, told The Verge that his institution dissipates power from ample infrared panels. In bid to support the electronics safe from radiation, Johnston said they stripped the Nvidia H100 GPU “down to the basics” and shielded the electronics pinch tungsten, lead, and aluminium, among different materials that are dense and lightweight.

But infrared radiation besides has the imaginable to interfere pinch telescopes, according to John Barentine of the defense group the Center for Space Environmentalism. The group has not travel retired for aliases against abstraction information centers, Barentine said, but they are concerned astir the effect of imaginable ray contamination from reflective surfaces connected the spacecraft connected astronomy research. Space companies often categorize those spacecraft specifications arsenic “trade secrets,” starring to a “chicken-and-egg business correct now,” Barentine said. “We can’t really opportunity pinch a batch of certainty what the impacts will beryllium because we don’t cognize the specifications because the companies haven’t aliases won’t disclose them.”

Starcloud’s Johnston said their satellites will ne'er beryllium visible successful the nighttime sky, only erstwhile the Sun is conscionable astir to look aliases conscionable aft it’s set. “You can’t really do astronomy astatine dawn aliases dusk, anyway,” Johnston said.

“That is not wholly true,” McDowell, who has worked for 37 years arsenic an astronomer astatine the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, told The Verge. “There are things that we do request to observe astatine dawn and dusk, peculiarly things adjacent the sun, for illustration asteroids that mightiness beryllium coming adjacent to the Earth — which we really don’t want to miss,” he said.

Despite earthly wariness from astronomers extracurricular Big Tech, the fame of abstraction information centers is apt to proceed for years and moreover decades. Both Google and startup Aetherflux scheme to motorboat satellites successful early 2027. Starcloud plans to motorboat its 2nd outer successful October 2026 and past “ramp up accumulation successful 2027, 2028,” Johnston said. He views SpaceX arsenic Starcloud’s main competitor, contempt nary charismatic mention from Musk’s institution connected erstwhile a abstraction information halfway mightiness beryllium launched, only a post connected X from Musk astir SpaceX “simply scaling up Starlink V3 satellites” to execute this. Blue Origin has reportedly been moving connected abstraction information centers for complete a twelvemonth but has besides not publically commented connected immoderate plans.

Constellations adjacent to Earth coming bully opportunities for “trying to make life amended present backmost connected Earth,” abstraction intelligence Akhavan-Tafti said. But it needs to beryllium done successful a sustainable way: “How do we support debased Earth orbit unfastened for business for generations to come?”

One option? Avoid launching much worldly into orbit, according to Seth Gladstone of Food & Water Watch, the environmental group starring a petition to halt information halfway construction. “Why is it that Big Tech ever seems to deliberation a solution to its galore Earth-bound problems is to blast much worldly into space?”