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AI Buildout Economics Tracker

The math behind the data-center buildout: what a megawatt of AI capacity costs to build, where the money goes inside a facility, what power and land cost, and the launch-cost economics that decide whether orbital data centers ever make sense. One row per figure, every figure cited.

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Vintage: 2026-09. Launched September 25, 2026 with 20 figures across 5 categories. The two numbers that frame the whole tracker: a fully loaded AI megawatt costs ~$34–55M all-in (GPUs are ~65–70% of it), and orbital compute needs launch costs to fall from ~$2,720/kg today to ~$500/kg before it reaches cost parity. Weak-provenance items (second-hand blogs, 'reportedly' claims) are flagged as proxy rather than dropped.

20 of 20 rows

EntityMetricValuePeriodConfidenceSource
Cushman & Wakefield
Build cost per MW
Greenfield data-center construction cost per MW (excl. chips/GPUs)New
Up 21% per MW since late 2024 — far outpacing ~5% general inflation. Largest component: power infrastructure (21%), then core-and-shell + sitework (17%), contingency (16%); land is just 7%. Switchgear prices climbed 60% since Dec 2021.
$8.9M–$23.3M per MW2026Press-reported[1]
Turner & Townsend
Build cost per MW
Global data-center construction cost indexNew
AI-grade high-density facilities cost 7–10% more to build than traditional air-cooled builds (advanced cooling, power, complexity). Range: $6.64/watt in Mumbai (2nd cheapest) to ~$14.3/watt in Tokyo (most expensive); global cost inflation averaged 5.5% in 2025.
$6.64–$14.3 per watt2025Proxy / estimate[2]
Alpha-Matica (estimates)
Component & hardware economics
100 MW AI facility cost breakdownNew
Warm shell (building + power + cooling, no IT): $0.9–1.5B ($9–15M/MW) — electrical systems ~50%, mechanical/cooling 15–20%, shell 10–15%, land 4–7%. IT equipment (servers, networking, ~100k GPUs at $25–40k each) adds $2.5–4B+. The GPUs are roughly 65–70% of the total project — the building is the minority.
$3.4–5.5B+ all-inSep 2026Proxy / estimate[3]
NVIDIA
Component & hardware economics
DGX GB200 NVL72 cabinet priceNew
72× B200 GPUs + 36× Grace CPUs per rack; draws ~120–132 kW, weighs ~1.36–3,000 lb, requires direct-to-chip liquid cooling. The rack — not the chip — is the unit of data-center economics now.
$3M per rack2026Press-reported[4]
Spheron (cloud market)
Component & hardware economics
GB200 NVL72 cloud rental rateNew
~$756–$1,944/hour for a full 72-GPU rack; B200 on-demand ~$8.26/hr. Rental pricing is the market's real-time read on GPU scarcity.
$10.50–$27 per GPU-hourMar 2026Press-reported[5]
Morgan Stanley (via analysts)
Component & hardware economics
Next-gen Vera Rubin NVL72 projected rack priceNew
Memory (HBM4) is the biggest cost driver; Morgan Stanley's BOM estimate puts the next NVL72 generation at ~$7.8M vs ~$3.99M for GB300. Rack power density keeps climbing: 120 kW → 220 kW per rack.
~$9.1M per rack at 220 kWProjectedProxy / estimate[6]
Noreva
Power & operating costs
US renewable PPA average priceNew
Average across 132 deals (~$36B) signed in 2026 — roughly 25% higher than comparable deals a few years ago. Buyers are locking in a durable higher price band, driven by data-center demand.
$58.68/MWh2026Press-reported[7]
CEPR / VoxEU
Power & operating costs
Effect of one data center on residential electricity pricesNew
10 facilities ≈ +13% vs the post-AI mean; one 60-acre hyperscaler ≈ +4%. Each facility also adds ~34 MW to summer peak demand and drives +$11.6M in utility distribution spending. The who-pays question, quantified.
+0.182¢/kWh per facility2026Press-reported[8]
Northern Virginia market
Land, water & resources
Data-center land prices and colocation rentsNew
Amazon paid $700M for 189 acres — the highest price ever for undeveloped Virginia land; some deals topped $8M/acre. CBRE: asking rents for 10+ MW requirements reached $155–$185/kW/month (2026) vs $105–$115 for older wholesale deals. NoVA ended 2025 with 4,039.6 MW inventory; 96% of 2026 supply pre-committed.
$3.7M/acre (Amazon, record)2025–2026Press-reported[9] [10]
US data centers (LBNL / NVIDIA)
Land, water & resources
Data-center water consumptionNew
Conventional cooling-tower designs consume ~2.6M gallons per MW per year. US data centers used ~17.5B gallons directly in 2023, projected to reach 38–73B gallons by 2028 (LBNL). Closed-loop liquid cooling (Rubin-class) cuts this to near zero at higher upfront capex. Hyperscaler WUE: Amazon 0.12, Microsoft 0.30 L/kWh.
~2.6M gallons per MW per year2023–2028Press-reported[11] [12]
Global data-center construction market
Land, water & resources
Annual construction market sizeNew
Precedence Research: $277.72B; Business Research Company: $293.69B. North America is ~38–42% of the global total — the buildout is concentrated where the power and the hyperscalers are.
$278–294B2026Press-reported[13] [14]
Derived (from this tracker)
Land, water & resources
What $1B buys in AI capacityNew
Derived estimate: at $8.9–23.3M/MW without GPUs, $1B buys ~43–112 MW of powered shell and cooling; fully loaded with GPUs (~$34–55M/MW all-in), $1B buys ~18–30 MW of AI-ready capacity. At that math, the projected $800B of 2026 hyperscaler capex translates to roughly 15–45 GW of new AI capacity, depending on the facility-vs-GPU spend mix.
~18–30 MW fully loaded2026Proxy / estimate[1] [3]
SpaceX
Orbital data centers
Launch cost to low Earth orbitNew
$74M list ÷ ~17,500 kg. Standard rideshare slots run ~$7,000/kg on SpaceX's Feb 2026 price table; Starship targets <$100/kg. An H100 chip (~2.4 kg) costs ~$6,500 to launch before chassis, panels, radiators, or shielding.
~$2,720/kg (Falcon 9 reusable)2026Press-reported[15]
Varda / Google / SpaceX
Orbital data centers
Orbital-compute cost-parity launch thresholdsNew
The whole economic argument in one line: orbital compute costs ~3× per watt vs terrestrial today (Varda); cost parity for targeted workloads arrives at ~$500/kg (parity window 2028–2030 if Starship hits it); Google's internal Suncatcher calculation puts viability at ~$200/kg or less (reported secondhand); SpaceX's Starmind filing arithmetic needs ~$100/kg vs ~$1,500/kg today.
$500/kg → $200/kg → $100/kg2026 analysesProxy / estimate[16] [17] [18]
SpaceX (FCC filing)
Orbital data centers
Starmind orbital data-center constellationNew
Each ~4,000 kg, 150 kW peak power (ceiling 250 kW), 500–2,000 km sun-synchronous orbits, ~5-year design life. Capital benchmark ~$170B per 1 GW of orbital data center. 80% to graveyard orbits at end of life, 200,000 by atmospheric disposal. FCC comment period closed Mar 6, 2026.
Up to 1,000,000 satellitesJan 2026 filingPress-reported[18]
Turyshev et al. / thermal analyses
Orbital data centers
Space radiator heat-rejection limitNew
No air, no water, no convection — only radiation (Stefan–Boltzmann limit). A 1 MW high-sunlight system needs ~5,640 m² of PV plus ~2,500 m² of radiator before any other spacecraft mass. Google's Suncatcher test chips run only ~15-minute bursts before shutting down to let radiators catch up — cooling is the binding constraint.
~780 W/m² at 70°C2026Proxy / estimate[19] [20]
Barclays (Jun 2026)
Orbital data centers
Orbital vs terrestrial build costNew
Barclays estimates ~$50M/MW to build orbital — over 3× terrestrial — with a five-year full-lifecycle cost of ~$51B/GW vs ~$16B on the ground (via analyst summary). An independent engineering model puts orbital at $158–747B per GW over five years (10–47× terrestrial).
~$50M/MW orbital vs ~3× terrestrialJun 2026Proxy / estimate[21]
Starcloud
Orbital data centers
Best-funded orbital data-center startupNew
$250M Series A extension (Aug 21, 2026) led by Manhattan West with Nvidia and Cisco investing. First Nvidia H100 flown to orbit Nov 2025 (trained NanoGPT in space). Working with Nvidia on the Space-1 Vera Rubin Module (25× H100 compute). Target: 88,000 satellites / 20 GW orbital compute.
$450M total raised; $2.3B valuationAug 2026Press-reported[22]
Star Catcher
Orbital data centers
Orbital power-beaming gridNew
$88M total raised to build an optical-power-beaming orbital energy grid: ~200-satellite constellation beaming concentrated solar to client satellites for up to 10× more power on existing panels. Record: beamed 1.1 kW at Kennedy Space Center. 7 signed power purchase agreements; $3B+ commercial pipeline.
$65M Series A (May 2026)May 2026Press-reported[23]
Starlink / ISL research
Orbital data centers
LEO latency vs terrestrial fiberNew
Fiber still wins end-user latency. But light in vacuum travels ~47% faster than in fiber, so a LEO laser-ISL mesh can beat the fastest terrestrial cables on intercontinental routes. Starlink Gen-2 satellites handle ~80–100 Gbps each; Suncatcher's 2027 two-satellite mission is explicitly a high-bandwidth laser-link test.
LEO ~20–40 ms vs fiber 5–10 ms2026Press-reported[24] [25]

Sources

  1. Data center construction costs jump 21% since 2024 (Cushman & Wakefield (via CRE Daily))
  2. Global AI data centre boom threatens to outpace supply chain (Turner & Townsend (via New Civil Engineer))
  3. Deconstructing the data center: a look at the cost structure (Alpha-Matica (estimates))
  4. NVIDIA's GB200 superchip: B200 NVL72 AI server $3 million (TweakTown)
  5. NVIDIA GB200 NVL72 guide (rental pricing) (Spheron)
  6. How NVIDIA's $9M Rubin NVL72 is redefining AI data center economics (Lian Li (Morgan Stanley BOM via Medium))
  7. Analysis of $36 billion in US power deals signals durable shift to higher prices (Noreva (via Business Wire))
  8. How data centres affect electricity prices, and whom (CEPR / VoxEU)
  9. Amazon pays $700M for 189 acres in Northern Virginia (Commercial Observer)
  10. Data centers turned Northern Virginia into a CRE hotspot (Ainvest (CBRE))
  11. How much water do data centers use (NVIDIA figures) (GPUSmith (NVIDIA))
  12. AI data center water usage statistics (LBNL) (Axis Intelligence (LBNL))
  13. Data center construction market (Precedence Research)
  14. Data center construction global market report (GII Research (TBRC))
  15. Space data centers explained: the economics, the physics, and the Starship problem (Wangdoo)
  16. SpaceX's space data center dream runs into four very earthly problems (Varda analysis) (AlphaStreet (Varda))
  17. Google-SpaceX orbital AI data center deal ($200/kg internal bar) (BigGo News (reported))
  18. Starmind orbital AI data centers face a governance test (ByteVyte)
  19. AI-focused data centres consume as much electricity as 100,000 homes (thermal analysis) (Now.Solar)
  20. The shadow side: the thermal claim that makes the data center story sound true (Spacewar)
  21. First principles: S-1 and space economics — the real boundaries of orbital AI data centers (Barclays) (Barclays (via Medium summary))
  22. Starcloud $250M data center satellite network, Nvidia (GeekWire)
  23. Star Catcher raises $65M Series A to fuel in-orbit power grid (Via Satellite)
  24. Starlink vs broadband: speed, latency, global connectivity breakdown (Tech Times)
  25. Inter-satellite link latency analysis (arXiv 2511.15861) (arXiv)

How to cite this page

SundayPyjamas Impact Foundation. "AI Buildout Economics Tracker." Impact Suite. Accessed September 25, 2026. https://sundaypyjamas.org/tracker/ai-economics.