President Trump will visit Pittsburgh to promote a $2 billion plan to turn a closed steel mill site into a power plant and data centers to support artificial intelligence. The project aims to create an AI hub and support 3,000 jobs, a decade after Nippon Steel invested $2 billion to keep 3,000 steelworkers employed at a local U.S. Steel mill.
The project is part of a broader effort by Pennsylvania leaders to attract AI-data center investment. Governor Josh Shapiro has touted Amazon’s $20 billion plan to build two data centers in the state, drawing some of its power from the state’s electrical grid, where natural gas is the dominant energy source [1]. The state is offering millions of dollars in tax breaks to build these centers.
The $2 billion AI hub project, if successful, could significantly boost the state’s economy and job market.
The one problem is the same Northeastern politicians who killed the tobacco farms and the industrial sites also killed and/or are killing our nuclear power industry.
Ahh…, if only buzzwords and hot air emanating from (D) Gov. Shapiro turned turbines. All one needs to do is see the names of his legislative proposals to see that PA will face significant electricity shortages going forward. As if more evidence were needed, the astoundingly stupid abandonment of nuclear generation by our rulers is an indicator of failure of governance.
Things will continue to unravel, likely at an accelerating pace, as cumulative other failures to govern ourselves - like debt and/or political violence, for instance - assert themselves as they inevitably must.
McCormick’s goal is to promote western Pennsylvania’s natural gas reserves, electricity resources that can power AI, steel to build data centers and what he described as a workforce skilled in both advanced computing and trades. He said Trump was an easy sell when he asked him to attend last fall and that they discussed the summit again while watching the NCAA wrestling championships in Philadelphia this spring.
The amount of steel used is trivial. The employment at the data center is trivial.
These things belong out in the boonies. Putting them in a city is just an indication that the city/state is so poorly run that it will never have productive use for its land.
Excellent point! The Powers That Be talk about the $Billions to be invested in PA – but that hides the insidious lie about many “local” investment schemes: Where do those $Billions actually get spent?
In this case, most of the money will be spent promoting the economies of Taiwan and China, who will do the hard job of creating the essential hardware for the datacenters. And much of the rest of the money will be spent on lawyers & bureaucrats in the DC Swamp. Not much left for Pennsylvania.
Two months ago, President Trump stood in a cavernous, local U.S. Steel mill heralding a $2 billion investment from buyer Nippon Steel to keep 3,000 steelworkers employed for at least another decade.
He’s returning Tuesday to tout a very different Pittsburgh industry, but one also connected to a $2 billion mill overhaul. This one, in the nearby city of Aliquippa, would turn a long-closed mill site into a power plant and data centers to support artificial intelligence.
Among the sites they picked: the former massive steel mill along the Ohio river in the faded steel town of Aliquippa, which once employed more than 13,000 workers.
Project developer Fezzik Energy, a four-person team, said they aim to start construction later this year on the grass-covered slag heap where the mill once stood. The company said it is in talks with end users who would help privately finance a power plant and data center on more than 100 acres.
Such projects have their share of critics, including environmental groups. The centers suck up enormous amounts of electricity, which can drive up carbon emissions. The Aliquippa site would generate its own power via a proposed 500-megawatt natural gas power plant, enough to power a small city.
The data centers also won’t come close to replacing steel mills where shift changes once had thousands of employees punching in and out. The sites don’t require many workers after they are built, limiting their labor impact.
Still, the Aliquippa project has generated enthusiasm in a suburban city that has lost nearly two thirds of its population since 1960, and where the poverty rate is nearly 20%. It’s one of many economically battered communities with abandoned industrial sites in western Pennsylvania.
“I feel hopeful that we’re going to be the next big thing,” said Dwan Walker, Aliquippa’s Democratic mayor. The project is expected to bring in about $95 million in property tax revenue over 10 years to the city of about 9,000.
Gov. Shapiro is big on global warming and renewables. There is concern among those in touch with reality that, even before the “miracle” of AI centers, Pennsylvanians were likely in store for outages like Spain’s. Glad I have a standby generator (natural gas, sadly not nuclear). It even runs my zoned Mitsubishi Mr. Slim heat pumps for the rooms we actually inhabit).
Why can't a few crypto bros buy a dead industrial town in the upper midwest with rusted old factories, rebuild them, start manufacturing products there, hire Americans (only) massively, and then sit back and watch as it becomes an idyllic hub of peace and prosperity for young…
We all know what would really happen if anyone tried that. They would need an expensive permit from the local government to pull down the rusty old factories. Then the EPA would find an endangered spotted owl nesting in the ruined factory, and the permit would be cancelled. Meanwhile, State politicians would have passed a law that at least 50% of people employed in the factories have to be female illegal aliens of color, with priority given to those with physical or mental handicaps. And then fat cat lawyers would be suing everyone involved in the developments for any silly cause they could dredge up.
There will be no peace and no re-industrialization until most of the Political Class are strung up, most of the bureaucrats are fired, and all the lawyers consider themselves lucky to get jobs picking potatoes.
This is by far the biggest problem. Title Vii is a major disaster. Only partly due to having to hire not based on merit, but for all practical purposes it completely eliminates the ability to manage a business because you cannot fire anyone either. If you cannot hold people accountable, you cannot manage the business.