Cipher Mining · Colorado City, Texas

Anthropic Barber Lake

300MW projected

The power of 240,000 US homes, once built.

Under construction. Projected to draw 300 MW by Apr 2027.

Chips
TPU v7
Users
Anthropic
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Power over time

facility power · 5 milestones
Every milestone
  1. 18 Sep 2025 — Site grading and civil works begin.
  2. 29 Nov 2025 — Foundations of Building 1 are visible.
  3. 30 Jul 2026 — Building 1 shell is complete, with rooftop units installed, and most air-cooled chillers in place in a ground yard to the north. Most of the 120 backup diesel generators are also in place. Substantial progress since Nov 2025, still under construction and not yet energized.
  4. 30 Dec 2026 · projected 244 MW Building 1 Phase I is operational: 168 MW critical IT power (244 MW gross), running Google TPU v7 (chip type inferred, tagged likely). We estimate ~Dec 2026, about 3 months later than the disclosed target, because the site is shell-complete but not yet energized as of the Jul 2026 image. Disclosed target: Cipher 2025-09-25 PR states the 168 MW critical IT load is "expected to be delivered by September 2026."
  5. 30 Apr 2027 · projected 300 MW Building 1 Phase II is operational: 207 MW total critical IT (300 MW gross). Phase II adds 39 MW critical IT (see Cipher 2025-11-20 PR). We estimate ~Apr 2027, about 3 months later than the ~Q1 2027 target, based on construction progress.

Every step Epoch planned here on 2 Sep 2026 is still on plan. Planned against reached

Gas made 40% of the power on this site's grid

net generation by fuel · Oct 2025 to Sep 2026

Electric Reliability Council of Texas, Inc. ERCO · balancing authority

  1. Gas 40%
  2. Coal 12%
  3. Nuclear 8%
  4. Wind 24%
  5. Solar 16%
  6. Hydro <1%
  7. Other <1%

The grid of the utilities that serve Mitchell County, TX. Each grid is a balancing authority. Generation only; imports are excluded. Every grid behind an AI site.

Owners plan 276 MW of new power in Mitchell County, mostly solar

power plants in Mitchell County · EIA-860M, September 2026
  1. Hackberry Creek Solar Solar · 175 MW · Mar 2028 · proposed · Hackberry Creek Solar, LLC
  2. Dolce BESS, LLC Storage · 101 MW · Apr 2028 · proposed · Samsung C&T Renewables, LLC

In service in Mitchell County today: 688 MW. Since January 2023: 1 MW added, 0 MW retired. A plant in the same county does not mean it feeds the site. Power plants near every AI site.

Sources

selected by Epoch AI
  1. Cipher signs 168 MW AI hosting deal with Fluidstack, Google backs it (Sep 2025)
  2. Cipher adds 56 MW gross to reach 300 MW at Barber Lake (Nov 2025)
  3. Cipher 8-K exhibit: 207 MW total critical IT load (SEC, Nov 2025)
  4. Anthropic to expand use of Google Cloud TPUs (Oct 2025)
  5. Anthropic $50B US AI infrastructure with Fluidstack (Nov 2025)
  6. DCD: Cipher secures Fluidstack as customer, Google as investor
  7. Air quality permit listing 60 x 3 MW plus 60 x 3.1MW backup generators

Data: Epoch AI, “AI data centers”, CC BY 4.0, retrieved 22 Oct 2026. Facility power adds cooling and other overhead to the IT power the servers draw. Placed at the centre of Colorado City. Grid: U.S. Energy Information Administration, Hourly Electric Grid Monitor (Form EIA-930), public domain, retrieved 16 Oct 2026; utilities by county from Form EIA-861 and the U.S. Census Bureau Geocoder, public domain. Power plants: U.S. Energy Information Administration, Form EIA-860M, public domain, inventory as of September 2026. All sources.