xAI has reportedly installed eight converted jet-engine turbines in Mississippi to help power its Colossus 2 data center in Memphis, according to a New York Times report that TechCrunch summarized on Nov. 3. The units are rebuilt versions of a General Electric engine commonly found on Boeing jets, supplied by ProEnergy. The Times cited state permits and satellite imagery.
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The reason is time. Rystad Energy analyst Audun Martinsen said it is all about getting power as fast as possible, and that with jet-powered units a data center can be running in 24 months. Grid hookups and new utility-scale turbines are slower: TechCrunch cites the International Energy Agency for about seven years to connect 100 megawatts in Northern Virginia.
In TechCrunch‘s telling, the conversion is a stopgap born of queue lengths rather than engineering preference. ProEnergy rebuilds the engines, and the appeal is that rebuilt aeroderivative units can be delivered and started far faster than purpose-built plant turbines, which carry their own multi-year order books.
ProEnergy’s PE6000 units and Crusoe’s 13-unit order
The supplier’s own paperwork shows the scale of the business. In an April 16 announcement, ProEnergy said it would deliver a 650-megawatt package of 13 PE6000 aeroderivative gas turbine generator sets, each rated at 50 megawatts, to Crusoe by summer 2027. ProEnergy will test-fit and quality-check the equipment at its Sedalia, Missouri, facility so it arrives ready to install. The units provide fast-start power on demand and can run on multiple fuels, and ProEnergy’s president and CEO, Jeff Canon, said the equipment is made in-house for reliability. Crusoe’s power infrastructure chief, John Adams, said the company is committed to an energy-first approach to AI infrastructure.
Crusoe is building the Abilene, Texas, campus for OpenAI’s Stargate project. In September it walked away from a $1.25 billion plan to buy 29 of Boom Supersonic’s 42-megawatt Superpower turbines, with first deliveries planned for 2027. Crusoe spokesperson Andrew Schmitt said the partnership was not the right fit today and that Crusoe still intends to use turbines, just not Boom’s, per TechCrunch’s September report.
Boom’s Superpower illustrates the other path. TechCrunch’s September report says the turbine shares about 80% of its parts with the Symphony engine Boom is developing for its Overture supersonic jet, and that Boom raised $300 million in 2025 to commercialize the stationary power business, with profits meant to help fund Overture. Boom CEO Blake Scholl said the company will deliver about 250 megawatts of Superpower units next year and target 1 gigawatt in 2028. Crusoe says it chooses energy sources site by site, among turbines, wind, solar, batteries and the grid.
Seven years for 100 megawatts in Northern Virginia
The wait is not new. Bloomberg reported in August 2024, in a piece carried by Data Center Knowledge, that Dominion Energy expected connection times for large data centers to grow by one to three years, to as long as seven years. A Dominion representative put the wait at four to seven years, on top of a process that had taken three to four. The longer queue applied to loads of more than 100 megawatts, almost all of which in Dominion’s territory are data centers.
Supply of new gas turbines is also tight. Mitsubishi Power told Bloomberg that most of its power capacity is expected to come on by 2031, TechCrunch reports. In England, Microsoft pulled out as anchor customer for Nscale’s Loughton data center after the local utility said it could not supply enough power until the early-to-mid 2030s. The IEA’s Energy and AI report frames electricity as the gating input for AI.
Efficiency and emissions costs of reused aircraft engines
Converted jet engines are less efficient and pollute more than turbines designed for conventional gas plants, TechCrunch reports, and the Times adds that more units are needed to produce the same amount of power. Some experts quoted say efficiency and environmental concerns may weigh more within a year or two, which would make the engines a short-term fix. TechCrunch also notes that demand has drawn in a supersonic jet startup, Boom, as a seller. The Trump administration has encouraged data centers to generate their own electricity, which pushes developers in the same direction.
OpenAI followed xAI in 2025 with gas turbines at its first Stargate site in Abilene, though TechCrunch does not say those were jet-engine units. Boom Supersonic, the jet startup, has begun selling a version of its engine as a data center power plant, with about 250 megawatts of Superpower units due to other sites next year according to its chief executive, Blake Scholl.
What remains unsettled is how long the stopgap lasts. With Mitsubishi pointing to 2031 and utilities quoting years for large hookups, the converted engines may run well past the 24-month window their buyers cite. Crusoe’s 650 megawatts of ProEnergy equipment alone equals six and a half of the 100-megawatt hookups that the IEA figure puts at about seven years apiece.
This article was produced with the assistance of AI and reviewed by Morning Overview editors prior to publication.
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