September 2026 Data Center Energy Report

The power landscape is decisively split: 47% of scored markets land in AVOID territory, while only 11% clear BUILD status. SPP emerges as the dominant outlier, with 91.7% of its markets rated BUILD and an average excess capacity of 68.8 MW—Rural SPP leads at a composite 74.9 with 10.8-month time-to-power. ERCOT's Midland–Odessa ranks highest overall at 83.0 composite, yet ERCOT itself registers just 5.3% BUILD penetration due to a brutal 54.9 average constraint score and 55.6-month average TTP, signaling severe interconnection gridlock across the region. PJM is functionally closed: zero BUILD verdicts, with Bristow and Reston both hitting 55+ constraint scores. NORDPOOL (Copenhagen, Helsinki) and WECC coastal zones (Quincy) form a secondary avoid cluster, but the real story is the North American binaries—SPP and upper-tier MISO markets (Upper Peninsula, Williston) remain the only buildable corridors with realistic 8–10 month deployment windows.

This distribution points to continued tightening through Q4 2026 and Q1 2027. SPP's extraordinary 16.0-month average TTP masks the reality that its low constraint scores (41.0) reflect available headroom rather than speed; new capacity is genuinely available, but interconnection queues remain opaque. ERCOT's 55.6-month TTP is not a lag—it is a structural bottleneck: the region's 66.1 average excess capacity is meaningless without transmission access, and power purchase agreement lead times are stretching. PJM's zero BUILD rating, combined with tight constraints across its portfolio, signals that Virginia and Pennsylvania corridors will remain capacity-constrained for hyperscale deployment. Allocators should treat SPP, Rural MISO, and ERCOT's Permian Basin as the only genuinely viable greenfield windows for 2027 starts; everywhere else requires 24+ month pre-acquisition power negotiations or carrier-dependent procurement.