Multi-State Delivery Politics Hit AI Campuses as Maryland Scores, Oregon Assigns Costs, and New Jersey Fines BTM Gas
Governor Moore’s EO puts 25 MW+ Maryland data centers on a public Aligned / Not Aligned dashboard without a moratorium, Pacific Power locks a POWER Act full cost-assignment deal for new Oregon loads, and NJDEP hits DataOne with a record $1.072M fine for ~123 MW of unpermitted gas — while Solaris prices $1.25B of onsite-power notes and Alibaba stacks chips toward >20 GW of cloud.
Today’s Signals
- Maryland EO 01.01.2026.16 – Moore creates 25 MW+ Data Center Accountability Task Force and public Aligned/Conditionally Aligned/Not Aligned dashboard; no moratorium; tax-exemption repeal still legislative.
- Oregon POWER Act – Pacific Power settlement assigns generation, storage, wires, and market purchases for new data centers to the load; PUC take-up eyed October / ~Nov 13.
- NJDEP DataOne Fine – Record $1.072M civil penalty for 62 Caterpillar G3516H units (~122.9 MW) run without air permits at Vineland site for Nebius; Bloom fuel cells as permanent path.
- Solaris Notes – Sep 22 prices upsized $1.25B of 7.000% senior notes due 2032 at par; close eyed Oct 1 for onsite-power growth capex.
- Alibaba Apsara – Zhenwu V900 (3x prior gen; commercial eyed Q1 2027); Qwen path to 5-10T params; Alibaba Cloud >20 GW by 2032.
The Big Story
The delivery constraint just went multi-state — three tools, one thesis. On September 23, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore signed Executive Order 01.01.2026.16 creating a Data Center Accountability Task Force and a monthly public dashboard for facilities at or above 25 MW seeking state permits, incentives, or support letters. Each project gets a public Aligned, Conditionally Aligned, or Not Aligned finding within about 60 days. Not Aligned projects lose agency facilitation and discretionary Commerce incentives until local approvals are documented — but the label alone does not kill a project, and the EO creates no new permit-denial power. Moore also banned new executive-branch NDAs with developers and will ask the General Assembly to repeal the 2020 data-center sales/use tax exemption — legislative, not self-executing. The same day, Pacific Power locked a POWER Act settlement with Oregon PUC staff, the Citizens’ Utility Board, and advocates assigning generation, storage, wires, and market-purchased energy for new data centers to the load itself, with PUC take-up eyed next month / about November 13 — settlement, not a final order. And on September 22, NJDEP assessed a record $1.072 million civil penalty on DataOne for 62 Caterpillar G3516H engines (~122.9 MW) run without air permits at a Vineland site being built for Nebius, with Bloom fuel cells as the permanent path — appealable administrative order, not a final judgment. East Coast scorecard, West Coast cost causation, hard-dollar air enforcement on temporary BTM gas — while capital still clears for turbines and GPUs.
AI
Keep the AI desk on silicon, models, and cloud capacity. At Alibaba Cloud’s September 22 Apsara conference, CEO Eddie Wu unveiled the Zhenwu V900 — Alibaba’s claim as China’s most powerful AI chip, about three times the prior M890, with clusters up to about 500,000 cards and commercial release eyed for the first quarter of 2027. The same package sketched a Qwen path toward five-to-ten-trillion-parameter models (current Qwen3.8-Max cited around 2.4 trillion) and a target for Alibaba Cloud to surpass 20 gigawatts of global capacity by 2032. Company roadmap, not contracted offtake or shipped wafers; supply-chain constraints acknowledged; Hong Kong shares jumped about 5%. Separately, WhiteFiber launched Continuum on September 23 — a distributed GPU fabric linking two QTS halls 83 kilometers apart at claimed 136 Tbps / 0.9 ms RTT — a networking workaround when single-campus power chokes.
Money
Credit did not freeze. On September 22, Solaris Energy Infrastructure priced an upsized $1.25 billion of 7.000% senior notes due April 1, 2032 at par — up from $1.0 billion — close eyed October 1, proceeds framed for growth capex at an onsite / distributed power rental franchise serving data-center and industrial loads. Priced book, not funded until closing. On September 23, USD.AI announced a $128.9 million non-recourse asset-backed GPU facility — its largest to date — financing 32 NVIDIA GB200 NVL72 systems in British Columbia for an unnamed publicly listed GPU-cloud operator under a multi-year deal with an investment-grade counterparty. Closed facility; borrower unnamed. Bloomberg-syndicated chatter still has Goldman marketing about $1.1 billion of high-yield bonds for Digital Drive near Richmond — Blue Owl-sponsored, 76 MW IT fully leased to CoreWeave under a 15-year, $2.94 billion contract, price eyed Wednesday. Marketing, not a print; do not invent a final yield.
Energy & Power
Behind-the-meter gas remains the bridge — and the enforcement risk is now priced in dollars. On September 21, Kodiak Gas Services announced a six-year deal to supply 76 MW of BTM baseload, including balance of plant, via about 40 reciprocating gas units to an undisclosed West Texas data-center operator contracted with an investment-grade hyperscaler and backed by a GPU-designer lease guarantor. Deployment starts fourth quarter 2026 and scales into first quarter 2027. Signed commercial power agreement, not a utility PPA; customer unnamed. Read it next to New Jersey’s DataOne order: the same reciprocating-fleet bridge credit will underwrite can also draw a seven-figure air penalty when permits lag.
Government Power
Beyond the Big Story’s three U.S. tools, Brussels added a comparable efficiency scorecard. On September 21 the European Commission adopted a Delegated Regulation establishing a common Union rating scheme for data centres: facilities above 500 kW that report under the energy-efficiency framework get electronic labels based primarily on PUE and WUE. First labels are due around mid-August 2027 after EP/Council scrutiny; Commission framing puts EU data-centre electricity at about 68 TWh in 2024 and about 114 TWh — roughly 3.2% of EU power — by 2030. Minimum performance standards are separately eyed for 2027 — not a hard ceiling in this act. Adopted delegated regulation under scrutiny, not an operating ban. Utility Dive’s September 23 roundup places MD/OR/NJ inside a national speculation-scrub via large-load tariffs and community opposition — secondary magnitude color, not a fresh Texas lead.
Startup and Small Business Signal
Europe’s neocloud lane cleared another equity check. On September 22, Helsinki-based Verda announced $189 million / EUR163 million in new funding, including an oversubscribed Series B led by Emergence Capital, with MUFG Innovation Partners, Supermicro, Varma, Lifeline, ENDUR, 6DC, byFounders, Tesi, and angels among participants. Company materials cite more than $450 million total funding, a valuation above $1 billion, and about $165 million ARR as of July. Closed equity round; unicorn and ARR are company-announced, not audited campus megawatts.
AMP Bottom Line
Who pays, who discloses, and whether temporary gas can run without permits — that is the delivery constraint now. Maryland scores campuses in public. Oregon assigns the full cost stack to the load. New Jersey put a seven-figure price on unpermitted BTM engines. Meanwhile Solaris priced $1.25 billion of onsite-power notes, USD.AI closed a $128.9 million GB200 facility, and Alibaba stacked chips toward a 20 GW cloud target. Politics is writing the rulebook in parallel with the markets that still fund the bridge.