Google Announces a $17 Billion Wyoming Data Center With a 702 MW Fuel Cell Plan and Carbon Capture: Size, Opening Date, Water Use and Capture Rate Are Not Given, and the Linked Storage Hub Page Is a 2022 Proposal

On November 5, 2026, Google announced its first data center in Wyoming, a $17 billion investment in Laramie County near Cheyenne. Google names four partners: Tallgrass Energy, Black Hills Energy, American Electric Power (AEP) and Related Digital. The post is about power, carbon capture, water and the local community. It does not say how large the data center is, how many servers or chips it will hold, or when it will open. The dollar figure is Google's own and has no breakdown.

The power plan has three parts. The first is a 702 MW fuel cell development, contracted with AEP, which Google calls the largest planned development of its kind with carbon capture and storage (CCS). Google says the fuel cells will be made in the United States by Bloom Energy and convert natural gas into electricity through an electrochemical reaction. The second is power from gas generators run by Tallgrass Energy and Black Hills Energy. The third is a front-end engineering and design (FEED) study of fitting Tallgrass's combined cycle turbines with CCS. Google says its total contracted CCS capacity is now nearly 1 gigawatt, counting an earlier US project it announced last fall.

AEP's own release, dated October 14, 2026, adds terms that Google's post leaves out. AEP says it plans to invest about $4 billion in the 702 MW project near Cheyenne under a 20-year power purchase agreement with Google. The project company, Cheyenne Fuel Cell, LLC, is about 92% owned and controlled by AEP and nearly 8% by funds advised by Basalt Infrastructure Partners. AEP expects construction to start in 2026 and the facility to be fully operational by the end of 2028. Neither source says whether the $4 billion sits inside Google's $17 billion, so the two figures should not be added or compared. AEP also says the fuel cells generate electricity without combustion of natural gas and describes the plan as near-zero emissions with carbon capture. Google says only that a large majority of the carbon emissions will be captured and stored. These are different words for the same plan, and neither source gives a capture rate.

The storage claim depends on a nearby site, Tallgrass's Eastern Wyoming Sequestration Hub. The Tallgrass page that Google links is a January 2022 press release. It says Tallgrass received a state grant to develop a CO2 hub in the Denver-Julesburg Basin, that the grant would fund development and a characterization well, and that a Class VI permit filing was anticipated. That 2022 release describes the plan at the time; the three reviewed sources do not establish the hub’s current permit or operating status. Current permit and operating records are needed to determine it.

On water, Google says the Wyoming data center will be air-cooled to reduce strain on local water resources, and that it will keep investing in local water replenishment. It gives no figures for water use. On cost, Google says it will pay for 100% of the power it uses and will cover infrastructure needs directly driven by its growth. The post does not define either promise further, and it names no utility tariff or agreement that would let a reader check them.

For the community, Google says it held a meeting in downtown Cheyenne with more than 200 residents. It expects the project to bring hundreds of millions of dollars in local property taxes to Laramie County and School District 1, plus grants for K-12 education, workforce development and skilled trades. Residents asked about the full economic picture, about jobs and skills training, and about how data center growth affects Cheyenne as a whole. In response, Google, Tallgrass, Black Hills, Related Digital, AEP and Bloom Energy are setting up a Community Council. The post gives no job count, no tax schedule and no council membership.

Our reading: the news is real but incomplete. The site, the partners, the 702 MW fuel cell contract and the cooling choice are stated plainly. The data center's size, schedule, water use and jobs are not, the capture rate is not given, and the storage hub shown in the sources is a 2022 proposal. A reader who follows energy or local planning should treat this as a statement of intent and watch for permits, the Community Council and AEP's construction progress.