Displaying items by tag: oak ridge data centers

The U.S. Department of Energy extolled the virtues of two proposed data center sites on the Oak Ridge Reservation in October 2025. DOE has since shifted its focus to potential sites in Ohio and Kentucky, and is not accepting the proposals for private data center development it solicited. As seen in this screenshot, DOE touted the nuclear-energy industries, infrastructure and expertise as draws for private data center development. DOE via Youtube

DOE shifts data center focus away from Oak Ridge to sites in Kentucky and Ohio

OAK RIDGE — The U.S. Department of Energy is at least temporarily moving its focus away from promoting federal Oak Ridge lands as sites for data centers and is instead looking at developing sites in other states.

The department not long ago touted Oak Ridge tracts of land as potential sites for private data centers, including at a virtual industry day on Oct. 15, 2025 attended by multiple companies from different industries.

It requested artificial intelligence data center proposals for those two federal parcels on Oct. 27. One was west of Oak Ridge National Laboratory at the intersection of Bethel Valley Road and Tennessee Highway 95 totaling 95 acres. The other included 150 acres at East Tennessee Technology Park, including 83 acres that is part of Manhattan Project National Historical Park and formerly the site of the K-25 complex, which enriched uranium for atomic bombs. The department showed aerial footage of these tracts in a video that is still up on YouTube.

Ben Williams, communications director for the Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management for DOE, said the department received proposals for the Oak Ridge sites in response to the request for proposals (RFP) before a Dec.1 deadline, but for now is turning them down. DOE will instead focus on completing and signing leases for data centers on two other sites: its Portsmouth site in Ohio and its Paducah site in Kentucky.