Data Center Construction in Texas

Seventy-five megawatts is the demand level at which Texas Senate Bill 6 starts treating a new customer as a large load in ERCOT, and most of the data center projects we are asked to price sit at or above it. A large load is a single site whose electrical demand is big enough that the grid operator studies it as its own interconnection case instead of as ordinary service. That definition changes how a data center gets built here, because the study, the financial commitments and the curtailment equipment all have to be settled before a crew mobilizes.

Data Center Builders of Texas builds mission-critical facilities for operators who need the electrical and mechanical systems to work before the building does. We start from power and cooling, then work back to the building and the site. The utility service sets the substation and the switchgear lineup, the switchgear lineup sets the electrical rooms, the heat rejection method sets the plant and its pads, and the data halls are laid out to fit those decisions rather than the other way round.

A full build means the shell, the power and cooling yards, the mission-critical slabs, the utility interconnection, the fit-out and the commissioning coordination moving as one schedule, with one builder accountable for how they meet.

SB 6 directs the Public Utility Commission to set interconnection standards for large load customers at 75 megawatts and above, or lower if the commission finds that necessary. Per the legislature's bill analysis, a large load must show site control, pay a flat study fee of at least $100,000 for initial transmission screening, meet financial commitment requirements, and, when it connects at transmission voltage after December 31, 2025, install equipment that lets it be curtailed during firm load shed. For a builder those items are schedule inputs, not legal footnotes.

Site control means the land position is settled before design money is spent in earnest. Curtailment equipment is something we have to find room for in the electrical one-line, the controls scope and the generator sequence of operations. Utility and power developers will recognize both items from their own side of the meter (see our work with utilities and power developers). We raise these points in the first meeting because an owner who learns about them after the drawings are issued pays for the rework in months, not dollars.

The civil package comes first: mass grading, drainage, detention, truck courts and the access roads that carry transformers and chillers to their pads. The building follows, usually a shell and core with raised-floor or slab-on-grade data halls, electrical and mechanical support rooms, a loading dock, security spaces and a fiber entrance room. The yards sit outside the building envelope and carry as much of the risk as the building does.

On the power side that means the owner's substation or a customer switching yard, duct banks and service entrances, and generator yards with fuel storage. On the cooling side it means chiller or dry cooler pads, piping to the building, and in some designs a water supply line and storage. Inside, we coordinate the data hall fit-out trades and the testing that follows.

We define critical load once, at the start, as the IT load the facility must carry at full redundancy, and then use that number consistently. From it we confirm the utility voltage, the transformer and switchgear count, the generator quantity and the cooling method. Only after those are agreed do we lock the structural grid, the slab depth zones and the building footprint. The order sounds backwards to people used to commercial work, but it keeps the building from being redrawn around equipment that arrives late.

Our preconstruction work, described under preconstruction and estimating, puts a price against each of those decisions so an owner can see what a change in redundancy or cooling method does to cost and to the energization date. Where the owner prefers a single contract for design and construction, design-build delivery lets the same team carry the electrical path through both phases.

Large transformers, medium-voltage switchgear, engine generators and chillers have lead times that outrun most building schedules, so the schedule is written backwards from their delivery. Texas has 23 ports, 12 of them deep-draft and 11 shallow-draft, and its ports handle more than 746.4 million tons of cargo, so heavy gear can land on the Gulf coast and travel inland. The last leg still needs route surveys, escort planning and bridge and utility clearance checks before a single unit moves.

We keep a receiving plan for every major piece: who unloads it, where it is stored, how it is protected from dust and weather, and when its pad and conduit stub-ups will be ready. Our approach to long-lead equipment procurement and our fast-track scheduling work are built around keeping those dates from drifting.

Texas has no single commercial building code enforced the same way in every city. Under Local Government Code Sec. 214.216, as amended by HB 738, the International Building Code is the municipal commercial code. Municipalities may adopt local amendments, and may review later ICC changes, by ordinance after a public hearing. A site in one city can therefore carry a different edition and a different set of amendments from a site two cities over.

We confirm the adopted edition and local amendments with the building department before design is finalized, and we track the utility service application, generator air authorization and fire marshal review as separate approvals with their own clocks. Our page on permitting and utility interconnection goes deeper, and projects around Dallas are a good example of how much local amendments matter.

Tell us the site, the planned load and the utility you expect to serve it. We will walk through the energization path, the long-lead gear and the code picture for your city, and return a preconstruction scope. Operators comparing sites in different cities, and developers building for a tenant not yet named, can send both options and we will price them side by side.

When should we start the utility interconnection process?

As soon as site control is secured, and before the building design is far along. Senate Bill 6 requires large loads to show site control and pay a flat study fee of at least $100,000 for initial transmission screening, so the land position and the study request go together. We recommend the electrical one-line and a conceptual site plan be ready to attach, since those are the documents the utility will ask for first.

Do you build only the shell, or the whole facility?

Either. Some owners hire us for the shell, yards and slabs and bring their own fit-out contractor. Others want one contract that runs from grading through commissioning coordination. The deciding factor is usually who owns the risk where the building meets the equipment, and we will say plainly where that interface sits under each arrangement.

How do city-by-city code differences affect a multi-site program?

Each city may be working from a different edition of the building code plus its own amendments, because the statute sets a base edition as the municipal floor and allows ordinances to change it. We build a short code memo for each site at preconstruction so the design team is not discovering amendments during plan review. Items like wind loading, fire separation and egress tend to differ most.

What drives schedule more, the building or the equipment?

Equipment, nearly every time. A shell can be erected in a predictable window, while transformers, switchgear and generators arrive when the manufacturer says and energization depends on the utility. We therefore present schedules in two tracks, one that we control and one that depends on third parties, so owners can see what a delay in either actually costs.