Taylor City Council voted 5-0 on Oct. 8 to approve a development agreement with Big Watt Digital and PowerHouse Data Centers for Taylor Technology Campus, a 664-acre data center and power project east of the city that could reach one gigawatt of capacity. In a joint press release, the partners said the campus will run on dedicated behind-the-meter natural gas Editorial image published alongside coverage of the Big Watt and PowerHouse Taylor data center campus approval.generation rather than drawing from the ERCOT grid, with first power targeted for the first half of 2028.
The City of Taylor approved annexation of the land between FM 112 and U.S. 79 into city limits under a 20-year agreement. The first phase is planned for 500 MW, with an option for another 500 MW, and construction is scheduled from 2027 through 2029. Data Center Dynamics reports the project includes a new 750MW on-site natural gas plant and the ability to sell surplus power back to the grid.
The power strategy is the point. ERCOT is tracking roughly 438,000 MW of large-load requests, nearly 89 percent of them for data centers, according to w.media. Building behind the meter lets the developers start on schedule without waiting for an interconnection queue that now stretches for years.
Approval came with binding conditions. The campus must use a closed-loop cooling system running on reclaimed water, with an initial fill of 1.575 million gallons. Noise cannot exceed 65 dBA. Buildings must sit 300 feet from most property lines and 700 feet from the southern line, behind a permanent 400-foot landscaped buffer. The developers will fund reclaimed-water improvements and withdraw a TCEQ wastewater discharge permit application.
In return, the partners committed $28.2 million in community investments, including $13 million to the city and $10.2 million to Taylor ISD. They are not seeking tax abatements. Taylor projects $1.38 billion in gross tax revenue from the project over 20 years.
"The introduction of the Taylor site demonstrates Big Watt and PowerHouse's immediate progress along with what the company was built to do," said Alex Hern, co-founder and co-CEO of Big Watt Digital. "By pairing digital infrastructure with dedicated, behind-the-meter power, we are designing for and addressing one of the biggest constraints facing data center development today."
The campus, formerly Project Mustang, withdrew its zoning and annexation application on Sept. 3 after the Planning and Zoning Commission tabled it in August. Residents opposing the project raised noise, air quality and water concerns, and some petitioned for a public vote.
PowerHouse, a division of American Real Estate Partners, accounts for 67 tracked sites on Baxtel. Baxtel counts 99 data center sites across the Austin market, operated by 37 providers, with 28 under construction.
Taylor shows what a gigawatt of Texas data center capacity now costs beyond the land and steel. The developers bought certainty by paying for their own generation and accepting enforceable local rules, a trade that grid-connected projects tied to ERCOT's queue cannot make on the same timeline. Behind-the-meter gas is becoming the fastest path to power in the state, and the communities that host it are setting the terms.
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