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The data center industry is expanding faster than the infrastructure needed to power, cool, build and staff it. JLL’s May 2025 recap of its annual Data Center Forum in Nashville described a market where demand is moving toward 100-megawatt-plus projects while electricity connections, suitable land, skilled workers and community acceptance remain difficult to secure. The practical consequence for developers and construction teams is that a data center is no longer only a building project: it is a coordinated power, utility, equipment, workforce and civic-engagement program.
The figures need careful dating. JLL forecast that 7–10 gigawatts (GW) would be absorbed during 2025, while the International Energy Agency’s 2026 update reported 17% growth in global data-center electricity demand during 2025 and projected consumption to rise from 485 terawatt-hours (TWh) in 2025 to about 950 TWh in 2030. The JLL numbers describe a North American market outlook made in May 2025; the IEA figures are global electricity data and projections. Neither should be treated as a complete 2026 census of projects.
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Data centers are being planned at a scale that can outstrip the assumptions built into conventional site selection and construction schedules. JLL Division President Matt Landek described the situation as “unprecedented demand alongside significant challenges in power and land scarcity, workforce development and sustainability requirements.” Those constraints interact: a site with abundant land may lack transmission capacity; a site with a nearby substation may face permitting or neighborhood opposition; and a project that can obtain power may still struggle to recruit the people needed to build and operate it.
For owners, general contractors, designers and public agencies, the central issue is sequencing. Electrical service, utility studies, equipment procurement, building shells, cooling systems and tenant fit-outs must be planned as one dependency chain. Delaying a utility decision can leave a finished structure waiting for energization, while selecting a high-density server design late can force expensive changes to mechanical and electrical systems.
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Demand is rising, but the headline market numbers are forecasts
JLL’s 2025 North American outlook
In its May 14, 2025 event recap, JLL said it expected 7–10 GW of data-center capacity to be absorbed during 2025. That is a contemporaneous forecast, not a confirmed full-year result. The same recap said transactions once considered large at 20 megawatts (MW) were increasingly being replaced by deals of 100 MW or more.
| Figure | What it describes | Qualification |
|---|---|---|
| 7–10 GW | Expected data-center absorption during 2025 | JLL forecast reported in May 2025; not a later measured result |
| 20 MW | Projects JLL said were once viewed as large | Historical comparison in the forum recap |
| 100 MW-plus | Scale of increasingly common transactions | JLL market observation, not a statement that every project reaches this size |
| 24% global CAGR | New data creation rate attributed to JLL Research by forum emcee Sean Farney | Underlying publication, base years and calculation details were not identified in the release |
The movement toward larger campuses changes construction risk. A 100 MW-plus commitment can require multiple substations, larger switchgear lineups, redundant distribution paths, more substantial backup generation and phased building programs. It also increases exposure to permitting, transformer availability, transmission upgrades and local objections. Developers should therefore treat “capacity” as a staged delivery plan rather than a single building number.
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Grid connection is a project dependency, not a late utility task
JLL’s recap quoted an average four-year power-delivery timeline across markets from its North America Data Center Year-End 2024 Report. That is an average cited by JLL for the report period; it is not a guaranteed current timeline for every utility, region or project. Local interconnection queues, transmission work, substation capacity, permitting and equipment lead times can produce materially different outcomes.
A construction schedule that ignores this dependency can invert the normal order of work. Site acquisition, design development and building procurement may proceed while the project still lacks a firm energization date. Conversely, a utility may require the owner to demonstrate a credible load profile, phasing plan or financial commitment before advancing studies. The power path should be documented before major commitments are made.
Questions to resolve during early site due diligence
- Which utility and transmission owner control service at the proposed site?
- What voltage, firm capacity and redundancy can be offered, and on what date?
- Are transmission, substation or feeder upgrades required outside the property boundary?
- What interconnection studies, deposits, permits and customer-side equipment are required?
- Can the campus operate in phases if the full requested load is not initially available?
- How will temporary construction power differ from permanent service?
These questions do not have a universal answer in the available market commentary. Current queue positions, equipment lead times and project-specific tariffs must be verified with the relevant utility and authorities for each location.
AI workloads are changing electrical and cooling design
JLL reported that some cabinets required 100–600 kilowatts (kW), far above the density assumptions used in many legacy facilities. “Some cabinets” is important: this is not a specification for every rack or workload. It is an indication that AI-oriented deployments can create concentrated electrical and heat loads that affect the entire facility.
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Electrical implications
- High-density zones may need dedicated busways, higher-capacity rack distribution and carefully coordinated protection settings.
- Power-conversion losses and fault-current levels must be addressed in the electrical design rather than treated as tenant equipment details.
- Phased commissioning should verify that a high-density block can be energized without destabilizing upstream distribution.
- Equipment rooms, clearances, floor loading and service access may need redesign when compute density rises.
Cooling implications
The forum recap said high-density demand was driving a shift toward liquid cooling and other cooling approaches. Liquid systems can move heat more directly from high-density equipment, but the appropriate design depends on the servers, facility topology, water strategy, maintenance capability and retrofit constraints. The cited material does not establish a universal efficiency improvement, water requirement or product preference.
| Cooling decision axis | What a project team should examine | Evidence available from the cited commentary |
|---|---|---|
| Achievable density | Whether the system can support the planned kW per cabinet and future increases | JLL establishes the density challenge; comparative thresholds are not stated |
| Water and energy effects | Water source, treatment, heat-rejection equipment and operating energy | Project-specific consumption is not stated |
| Retrofit suitability | Structural, piping, controls and maintenance changes in an existing hall | No comparative retrofit study is provided |
| Operating complexity | Leak detection, filtration, technician skills, spares and procedures | No quantified comparison is provided |
Designers should lock the anticipated cabinet-density range, cooling architecture and expansion strategy before finalizing major mechanical and electrical packages. A conventional air-cooled assumption can become a costly constraint if a tenant later requires liquid-cooled rows.
How developers are considering additional power sources
Forum participants discussed several responses to grid scarcity: onsite generation, small modular reactors, renewables, batteries and “shell cabinet” or plug-and-play sequencing. JLL presented these as options being explored, not as proof that any one technology is widely deployed or independently solves grid constraints.
| Option | Potential project role | Questions that determine suitability |
|---|---|---|
| Grid supply | Primary utility service and long-term operating capacity | Firm delivery date, upgrade scope, redundancy, tariffs and curtailment terms |
| Onsite generation | Supplemental or interim capacity, resilience and backup | Fuel logistics, emissions, air permits, noise, runtime and maintenance |
| Renewables with batteries | Generation support, peak management and emissions strategy | Resource profile, storage duration, land, interconnection and replacement cycles |
| Small modular reactors | Potential long-duration firm generation | Licensing, schedule, security, waste, financing and site-specific feasibility |
| Shell cabinet or plug-and-play sequencing | Prepare physical capacity before all equipment or tenant loads arrive | What is installed now, what is deferred, and how commissioning interfaces are controlled |
No comparative performance, emissions or cost ranking for these choices is established by the forum recap. A project team should evaluate deliverability, reliability, emissions, permitting and site fit together rather than selecting a technology from a headline alone.
A practical delivery sequence for a constrained project
- Define the load profile. Separate initial, expansion and ultimate loads; identify the proportion of high-density cabinets and the expected cooling method.
- Obtain a utility feasibility view. Confirm the serving entities, available capacity, study requirements, upgrade responsibilities and a realistic energization milestone.
- Test site and community constraints. Map transmission corridors, water and fuel access, noise-sensitive uses, emergency access, zoning and industrial-development concerns.
- Choose a phasing strategy. Decide whether buildings, substations, generation and cooling plants will be delivered in synchronized stages or through a shell-first approach.
- Coordinate equipment early. Align transformers, switchgear, generators, chillers, heat-rejection equipment, liquid-cooling distribution and controls with the utility and tenant schedule.
- Build commissioning around the actual load. Test protection, controls, cooling response, backup transitions and high-density zones under defined operating scenarios.
- Document expansion interfaces. Reserve space, pathways, structural capacity and connection points for later phases without assuming that future utility capacity is automatic.
Workforce shortages affect both construction and operations
JLL identified talent shortages and discussed retraining and recruitment from adjacent industries. The recap does not provide a comparable current vacancy rate or a local labor forecast, so staffing conditions must be assessed market by market.
Construction plans should identify the skills required for high-voltage work, controls integration, commissioning, liquid-cooling maintenance, safety management and digital documentation. Owners and contractors can widen the pool through apprenticeships, retraining for technicians from industrial, manufacturing or power backgrounds, and clear qualification pathways. Those measures help, but they do not remove the need to schedule scarce specialists early.
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Community acceptance and sustainability are project requirements
JLL said communities were raising concerns about noise, electromagnetic radiation and industrial development. These concerns can influence zoning, public hearings, operating restrictions and the willingness of local authorities to approve expansion. The cited material does not provide comparable acceptance statistics or measured effects for individual facilities.
A credible engagement plan should explain generator testing, cooling-plant operation, traffic, construction hours, lighting, emissions controls, emergency procedures and the difference between construction activity and steady-state operation. Questions about electromagnetic fields should be answered with the applicable standards, equipment information and monitoring approach rather than broad assurances.
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Sustainability decisions also need to be specific. A project should disclose its expected electricity source, backup-fuel strategy, water systems, heat rejection, waste handling and expansion assumptions. The IEA’s global outlook makes the scale of the issue clear, but it cannot determine a particular facility’s water use, carbon intensity or local grid impact.
Keeping the global electricity outlook separate from local projects
The IEA’s 2026 update reported that global data-center electricity demand grew 17% in 2025. It projected consumption to increase from 485 TWh in 2025 to approximately 950 TWh in 2030—roughly a doubling over that period. These are global figures and a forward projection, not a North American absorption result and not a guarantee for any individual campus.
For construction decision-making, the global trend explains why competition for power, equipment and skilled labor may remain intense. It does not answer whether a particular site can receive service, whether a local permitting authority will approve a generator plant, or how much water a proposed cooling system will consume. Those questions require location-, design- and date-specific evidence.
What the available market commentary does not establish
- Current 2026 interconnection queues or delivery dates for a specific utility.
- Project-by-project effects of tariffs on transformers, generators, servers or cooling equipment.
- Equipment lead times for a particular manufacturer or configuration.
- Water consumption for a given facility or cooling technology.
- Local labor vacancy rates, wage levels or retraining outcomes.
- Measured community acceptance or health impacts for an individual project.
These gaps are not reasons to defer planning; they are a reminder to replace broad market commentary with verified site data before committing capital.
Quick Recap
Checklist for owners, designers and contractors
- Record the source date and geography for every demand or capacity assumption.
- Obtain written utility milestones and identify dependencies outside the site boundary.
- Model initial, interim and ultimate loads, including high-density AI zones.
- Coordinate electrical, mechanical, structural and controls designs around the selected cooling architecture.
- Evaluate grid, generation, storage and renewable options against deliverability, reliability, emissions, permitting and site fit.
- Plan recruitment, training and commissioning support before the construction peak.
- Engage nearby communities with facility-specific information on noise, traffic, emissions and operating practices.
- Keep expansion interfaces explicit so future phases do not rely on undocumented assumptions.
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