--- title: "Power-hungry tech giants harness jet engines to fire up AI" description: "Tech giants in America are turning to repurposed jet engines to meet the surging electricity demand for AI data centers. Boom, a supersonic jet start-up, unveiled a modified Symphony engine for quick " type: "news" locale: "en" url: "https://longbridge.com/en/news/269629568.md" published_at: "2025-12-14T14:10:57.000Z" --- # Power-hungry tech giants harness jet engines to fire up AI > Tech giants in America are turning to repurposed jet engines to meet the surging electricity demand for AI data centers. Boom, a supersonic jet start-up, unveiled a modified Symphony engine for quick deployment. AI data centers consumed nearly 200 terawatt-hours last year, expected to rise to 600 terawatt-hours by 2035. Gas-fired turbines are being used due to grid congestion, with companies like OpenAI acquiring aeroderivative turbines. However, these turbines are less efficient and more polluting, leading to environmental disputes. In America, surging electricity demand from data centres used for artificial intelligence has sparked a scramble for gas-fired power – and even the biggest manufacturers can’t keep up. It’s created a gap in the market for the next best option: repurposed jet engines. This week, Boom, a supersonic jet start-up building a modern Concorde, unveiled a modified version of its Symphony engine that is designed to be able to be deployed quickly to data centres across the US. “Supersonic technology is an accelerant – of course, for faster flight, but now for artificial intelligence as well,” said Blake Scholl, Boom’s chief executive. His company is the latest to cash in as technology giants, including xAI, OpenAI, Google, Amazon and others, scramble for power to supply their ever-growing needs. Data centres used to train artificial intelligence software consumed just under 200 terawatt-hours of electricity in the US last year. But that figure will rocket to around 600 terawatt-hours by 2035, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA), potentially taking their share of total American power consumption from 4pc to more than 10pc. Much of this will have to come from “behind-the-meter”, or off-grid, generation because the American grid is too congested to handle so much extra demand, particularly as it is operational 24/7. This is what has led several tech giants to explore nuclear power to meet their needs. Yet with the exception of recently retired plants that can be brought back online, nuclear cannot be deployed at the speed that Silicon Valley billionaires such as Elon Musk and Sam Altman require right now. ## Gas guzzlers It means that, at least in the short-term, companies are piling into gas instead. The IEA estimates that around 260 terawatts, or two fifths of the total power consumed by data centres, will come from gas-fired turbines in a decade. But two thirds of the world’s gas turbines globally come from just three major manufacturers: GE Vernova, Siemens Energy and Mitsubishi. They have already seen orders for large turbines surge to their highest level since 2011 and are struggling to keep up with backlogs that now extend back five years or more, according to experts. These bottlenecks have prompted increasingly desperate tech companies, worried about falling behind in the AI race, to settle for converted jet engines, or “aeroderivative” gas turbines, to power their facilities instead. For example, Altman’s OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, has reportedly acquired 29 GE Vernova LM2500XPRESS turbines, an aeroderivative model, for its planned “Stargate” data centre in Abilene, Texas. Together, these would have a combined capacity of nearly one gigawatt – roughly equivalent to a nuclear reactor. Boom is also getting in on the action with the 42-megawatt Symphony engine. The company says it has agreed to supply 29 turbines to data centre developer Crusoe and already has a $1.25bn (£940m) order backlog. Scholl says he’s been “flooded with requests” for the equipment, and Boom is now drawing up plans for a “superfactory” to churn out several gigawatts’ worth of turbines. Yet while this kind of kit is fast and easy to deploy, it is far less efficient than a purpose-built combined-cycle gas turbine (CCGT) for power generation. These recycle hot air to drive a secondary turbine to gain extra efficiency, hence the name. According to GE Vernova, the jet-derived turbines used by OpenAI typically have an energy efficiency of about 40pc, compared with upwards of 64pc for the company’s 9HA CCGT turbine. ## Colossal problem? Over time, that means spending vastly bigger sums on fuel than would otherwise be necessary – and belching out more carbon emissions as well. This is one reason why xAI, the AI business founded by Elon Musk, has been embroiled in a dispute with residents in South Memphis, Tennessee, over its “Colossus” data centre. Outside the facility, a row of 15 fixed gas turbines is lined up and provides power 24/7. But campaigners in the Southern Environmental Law Centre (SELC) say Musk’s company installed the plants without permission and are seeking to block him from securing retrospective approval. They have taken the local authority, Shelby County Health Department, to court and argue that the turbines “pump out smog-forming pollution, nitrogen oxides or NOx, and harmful chemicals like formaldehyde” into the atmosphere. It could put residents at higher risk of asthma, heart disease and cancer, SELC says. “Our health shouldn’t be threatened at the hands of billionaires who circumvent the law,” Derrick Johnson, the group’s president, said recently. The controversy looks only set to grow. Musk has set out plans for the Colossus site to more than triple its consumption from just under 300 megawatts to one gigawatt – an increase that will need to be at least partly powered with more gas. xAI has also said some will come from solar farms. “I can’t emphasise enough, we need more electricity,” Musk said two years ago. “However much you think we need, it’s more than that, I assure you, and we need it as fast as possible.” That is, unless the rush into AI turns out to have something else in common with supersonic jets: hot air. ### Related Stocks - [OpenAI.NA - OpenAI](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/OpenAI.NA.md) - [AI.US - C3.AI](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/AI.US.md) ## Related News & Research | Title | Description | URL | |-------|-------------|-----| | ChatGPT 開始測試投放廣告 | OpenAI 開始在 ChatGPT 的免費版和最低付費版中測試廣告，旨在增加收入以應對成本上升。測試面向美國成年用户，涵蓋免費和 Go 訂閲方案（每月 8 美元）。儘管大多數用户未付費，OpenAI 承諾廣告不會影響回答內容，用户對話內容 | [Link](https://longbridge.com/en/news/275484431.md) | | 當前最值得購買的人工智能（AI）股票 | 投資者對 OpenAI 和 ChatGPT 的擔憂導致這家藍籌科技巨頭股價下滑 | [Link](https://longbridge.com/en/news/275696268.md) | | Anthropic 估值衝上 3500 億美元 阿布扎比 MGX 及黑石爭相追加投資 | 阿布達比 MGX 及黑石集團正爭相向 Anthropic 注資，Anthropic 估值已飆升至 3,500 億美元，集資額有望突破 200 億美元。MGX 計劃注資數億美元，若交易落實，將同時持有 OpenAI、xAI 及 Anthrop | [Link](https://longbridge.com/en/news/275546114.md) | | OpenAI 計劃本週在 ChatGPT 中推出新的模型，ChatGPT 月增長超過 10% | OpenAI 計劃本週在 ChatGPT 中推出新的模型，ChatGPT 月增長超過 10%。風險提示及免責條款 市場有風險，投資需謹慎。本文不構成個人投資建議，也未考慮到個別用户特殊的投資目標、財務狀況或需要。用户應考慮本文中的任何意見、 | [Link](https://longbridge.com/en/news/275322620.md) | | 一切向 “錢” 看！ChatGPT 正式開測廣告，網上罵聲一片 | OpenAI 開始對免費與低價訂閲用户測試廣告功能，以緩解高昂運營成本。此舉引發用户強烈反對，被批損害體驗與信任。競爭對手 Anthropic 藉機諷刺，OpenAI CEO 則激烈回擊。此舉背後是為支撐其千億美元級融資談判，向資本市場證明 | [Link](https://longbridge.com/en/news/275435957.md) | --- > **Disclaimer**: This article is for reference only and does not constitute any investment advice.