Key points
- Meta committed to Texas's data center standards on August 10, and Governor Greg Abbott's office announced it the same morning.
- Meta's largest Texas project, a $10 billion campus in El Paso, is not on the ERCOT grid. A law firm advising developers says projects outside ERCOT may not be subject to the directive.
- The Texas Tribune reported the same day that Meta took its Fort Worth and El Paso tax abatements through two Delaware shell companies. Ownership disclosure is one of the audit's requirements.
- CleanSpark backed the audit on its own, without a governor's release. Its entire 885 MW Texas portfolio is inside ERCOT.
Meta Platforms (META) will comply with Texas's data center standards, Governor Greg Abbott's office said on Monday, August 10.
"I established clear guardrails to ensure data centers protect our electric grid, conserve our water, respect our neighborhoods, and pay their own way," Abbott said.
Abbott ordered the audit on August 3, and new grid approvals have been frozen since. ERCOT's queue held more than 1,800 projects and over 474 gigawatts of requests, about 90% of it data centers. The audit asks developers to document power draw, water use, tax incentives, community impact and ownership.
Meta's biggest Texas project is not on the ERCOT grid
Meta has three data centers in Texas. Fort Worth broke ground more than ten years ago, Temple opened this year at a cost of $1.2 billion, and El Paso has been under construction since last fall.
El Paso is the large one. Meta raised its investment there from $1.5 billion to more than $10 billion and its footprint from 1.2 million square feet to 3.1 million, targeting 1 gigawatt of capacity when the site comes online in 2028. Gary Demasi, Meta's vice president of development and strategy, gave the figure at the Borderplex Alliance summit in March. In July, Meta said BlackRock would join it in a venture to develop and own the campus.
El Paso is served by El Paso Electric, which is not part of ERCOT. ERCOT covers about 90% of the state's electric load and leaves out El Paso, parts of the Panhandle and several East Texas counties. Law firm Foley & Lardner told data center developers that projects in the counties outside ERCOT, and projects running purely on behind-the-meter generation without an ERCOT interconnection, may not be subject to the directive.
The Texas Tribune published a piece on data center secrecy on August 10, the same day the commitment was announced. It reported that Meta negotiated multimillion-dollar tax abatements for Fort Worth and El Paso under shell companies called Winner, LLC and Wurldwide, LLC, both registered in Delaware, where owners do not have to be disclosed. Meta declined to comment on why it used them.
Abbott's August 3 letter to the PUCT and ERCOT lists disclosure of ownership and controlling interests as one of the items the audit must collect.
CleanSpark went public without being asked
CleanSpark (CLSK) put out its own support at 10:05 a.m. Eastern on Monday, in a post on X rather than a governor's release.
"CleanSpark fully supports Governor Abbott's directive to audit every data center project in Texas's interconnection queue," the company wrote. "The transparency requirements on power, water, tax incentives, and ownership are exactly the standard responsible developers should be held to. We welcome it."
The post named closed-loop cooling, grid support and local tax contributions, three of the five categories the audit asks developers to document.
CleanSpark's Texas capacity is inside ERCOT. On July 14 the company signed a 20-year triple-net lease at its Sandersville, Georgia campus with what it called a high-investment grade global technology company, covering 175 MW of critical IT load and $6.6 billion in contracted revenue, or up to $11.6 billion if both five-year extensions are exercised, with deliveries starting in the fourth quarter of 2027. The same announcement put Texas under option to the same tenant.
"Pursuant to the executed letter of intent, CleanSpark's entire Texas portfolio is now under exclusivity with the tenant," the company said. "The Texas portfolio totals 718 acres with up to 885 MW of secured and planned power capacity, including 271 acres with nearly 300 MW at our Sealy campus and 447 acres at the Brazoria campus, where transmission-level infrastructure supports an initial 300 MW demand load with the potential to expand to 600 MW."
Transmission-level infrastructure means grid power rather than on-site generation, and Abbott's August 3 directive exempts projects that generate their own.
Chief executive and chairman Matt Schultz called the Sandersville lease "a transformational moment for CleanSpark as we complete our evolution into a diversified digital infrastructure platform."
CleanSpark reported third fiscal quarter results on August 6. Revenue was $138.0 million, down 30.5% from $198.6 million a year earlier, and the net loss was $239.8 million, or 89 cents a share. The company held $814.9 million of bitcoin and $202.6 million of cash, and said it controls more than 1.8 GW of power capacity.
Nine companies have committed, one walked away
Abbott's office named companies as they responded, in releases on August 5, 6, 7 and 10. CleanSpark is the only one to announce its own support without appearing in one of them.
| Company | Response | Date |
|---|---|---|
| Diode | Withdrew its Henderson County project, saying it failed to meet the standards | Aug 5 |
| Amazon (AMZN) | Letter committing to work with the state and embrace the standards | Aug 5 |
| Google (GOOGL) | Welcomed the standards, committed to work with state leaders | Aug 5 |
| Chevron | Texas power plant for a Microsoft data center, built to limit water and grid impact | Aug 5 |
| QTS Data Centers | Committed to comply and to participate in the audit | Aug 6 |
| Skybox | Committed to comply | Aug 7 |
| Digital Realty (DLR) | Committed to comply, and issued its own press release | Aug 7 |
| MARA Holdings (MARA) | Committed to comply | Aug 7 |
| Meta Platforms (META) | Committed to comply | Aug 10 |
| CleanSpark (CLSK) | Posted support on X, not named in a governor's release | Aug 10 |
MARA was the first listed bitcoin miner on that list, three days ahead of CleanSpark. Its Texas mining sites are at Granbury and Garden City, and its West Texas expansion runs through a November 2025 letter of intent with MPLX to build gas-fired generation near MPLX's Delaware basin processing plants, starting at 400 MW with room to 1.5 GW.
Bernstein told clients on August 4 that the freeze makes already-approved capacity more valuable, and named Cipher Digital (CIFR), CleanSpark and Core Scientific (CORZ) as the most exposed, because their near-term expansion plans depend on new Texas grid connections. It listed TeraWulf (WULF), Riot Platforms (RIOT) and IREN Ltd (IREN) as insulated. All six are building or leasing AI data center capacity alongside bitcoin, a shift we tracked company by company in July.
Prices are as of 10:58 a.m. Eastern on Monday. Meta was the only name in the group trading higher.
| Company | Price | Change |
|---|---|---|
| Meta Platforms (META) | $602.83 | +1.8% |
| Digital Realty (DLR) | $191.31 | -1.3% |
| CleanSpark (CLSK) | $11.94 | -2.9% |
| Core Scientific (CORZ) | $20.26 | -3.6% |
| Cipher Digital (CIFR) | $16.53 | -3.8% |
| IREN Ltd (IREN) | $39.53 | -4.1% |
| Riot Platforms (RIOT) | $19.65 | -4.2% |
| MARA Holdings (MARA) | $9.65 | -4.4% |
| TeraWulf (WULF) | $16.33 | -4.4% |
Governor Kathy Hochul signed a first-in-the-nation moratorium on new hyperscale data centers in New York on July 14, and TeraWulf fell 6.7% that day, the hardest hit name in the group.
"Any project that fails to comply with the requirements set forth by the PUCT and ERCOT, and by state law, must be denied connection to the Texas grid," Abbott said in the August 3 letter.
Sources
- Office of the Texas Governor, releases of August 5, 6, 7 and 10, 2026, for the list of companies responding and the Abbott quotes
- Texas Tribune, August 10, 2026, by Taylor Goldenstein and Emily Foxhall, for the Winner, LLC and Wurldwide, LLC abatements and Meta's declined comment
- Foley & Lardner client alert, August 2026, for which projects may fall outside the directive
- CleanSpark's post on X, August 10, 2026, and its July 14, 2026 press release for the Sandersville lease terms, the Matt Schultz quote and the Texas exclusivity paragraph
- CleanSpark third fiscal quarter 2026 results, August 6, 2026, for revenue, net loss, loss per share and the 1.8 GW figure
- Bernstein research note, August 4, 2026, via The Block, for the exposed and insulated lists
- Intraday prices as of 10:58 a.m. Eastern, August 10, 2026
