Soluna Holdings, Inc., a green artificial intelligence (AI) data center developer, has entered into a definitive agreement with Applied Digital Corporation, a developer and operator of digital infrastructure, high-performance computing (HPC), and AI cloud services, to establish a jointly owned company to develop a planned 50 MW critical IT data center for AI and HPC workloads at Project Dorothy 3 in Texas.
Project Dorothy 3 is a planned data center co-located with Briscoe Wind, a 150 MW wind farm in Briscoe County. According to a press release, Dorothy 3 will draw power from both the wind farm and the grid.
“We have said for a long time that the constraint in AI is energy access, not chips,” said John Belizaire, Soluna Chief Executive Officer. “We built Soluna to bring load to the generation, so the power would be ready when the demand arrived. Partnering with Applied at Dorothy 3 puts that strategy to work: our site and wind power, combined with a proven builder and operator of AI data centers. We look forward to completing the remaining steps, including the tax abatement process in Briscoe County, and to bringing this project forward with the local community.”
Under the transaction agreement, Soluna will contribute a portion of the Dorothy 3 site, including land and power-related project assets, to the joint venture, with Applied Digital expected to provide capital to support development. Once the transactions outlined in the agreement are closed, Applied Digital will have a 51 percent interest in the joint venture, with Soluna holding the remaining 49 percent.
It was also announced that Applied Digital’s ChronoScale Holdings Corporation, an accelerated compute platform supporting AI workloads, has signed a non-binding letter of intent to lease the facility. However, the companies stated that there can be no assurance that a definitive lease will be entered into on the terms set out in the letter of intent. The lease is also subject to the negotiation and execution of definitive documentation.
In August, w.media reported that Texas Governor, Greg Abbott, directed the Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUCT) and the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) to conduct a verification audit of all data center projects moving through ERCOT’s interconnection process. While Soluna and Applied Digital intend to power Dorothy 3 with a mix of wind and grid power, the companies didn’t share what that mix looks like or how much power will need to be sourced from the grid. ERCOT’s Batch Zero approval process applies only to projects requesting 75 MW or more from the grid, so it’s possible this project could bypass that process.