Openai To Launch Ai Data Center In Norway, Its First In Europe

OpenAI said Thursday that it plans to motorboat Stargate Norway, its first AI information halfway successful Europe, successful business pinch British AI unreality infrastructure supplier Nscale and Norwegian power infrastructure patient Aker.

Nscale will creation and build nan site, and it will beryllium a 50/50 associated task betwixt nan 2 companies. OpenAI will beryllium an “off-taker” successful nan project, buying capacity from nan information center. 

The announcement comes arsenic Europe races to execute AI sovereignty and put successful information centers and compute power. Earlier this week, nan bloc unveiled specifications of its multi-billion-dollar investment into AI infrastructure, including 10 cardinal euros ($11.8 billion) to group up 13 AI factories and 20 cardinal euros arsenic an first finance successful nan factories. Data sovereignty is cardinal to that mission, owed to nan delicate quality of business and authorities data. 

It’s not clear if OpenAI’s information halfway is simply a portion of nan European Union’s plans to standard AI astatine home, and OpenAI did not instantly remark erstwhile contacted by TechCrunch. Nscale CEO Josh Payne told CNBC that portion of nan intent of this task is to “leverage European sovereign compute” for nan use of nan continent. Norway’s AI ecosystem, for illustration startups and technological researchers, will get privilege entree to nan center.

CNBC besides reported that Nscale and Aker person each committed astir $1 cardinal to nan first 20 megawatt (MW) shape of nan project. OpenAI says Stargate Norway will initially present 230 MW capacity, pinch plans to grow to 290 MW, and will tally connected 100,000 Nvidia GPUs by nan extremity of 2026.

The tract will beryllium located adjacent Narvik, a mini municipality successful bluish Norway. OpenAI said successful a blog post nan region is notable for its entree to hydropower, a cool climate, and a “mature business base.”

“The installation will tally wholly connected renewable powerfulness and is expected to incorporated closed-loop, direct-to-chip liquid cooling to guarantee maximum cooling efficiency,” said OpenAI. “Additionally, excess power from nan GPU systems will beryllium made disposable to support low-carbon enterprises successful nan region.”

Per nan EU AI Act, which took effect successful August 2024 and bans systems pinch “unacceptable risk,” companies building information centers must return steps to protect nan situation and beryllium transparent astir nan power depletion of AI models. Additionally, nan bloc’s Energy Efficiency Directive emphasizes power ratio successful nan ICT sector, which includes information centers. The directive besides directs information centers exceeding definite power input thresholds to retrieve discarded heat. 

The Stargate Norway announcement comes 7 months aft OpenAI announced it would invest $500 billion into 10 gigawatts of AI infrastructure successful nan United States complete nan adjacent 4 years, successful business pinch Oracle and Softbank. The woody besides follows nan motorboat of Stargate UAE earlier this year, and a precocious signed woody pinch nan UK government to accelerate AI take and boost infrastructure.