A New Era of Compute: Meta Initiates $10 Billion Gigawatt-Scale Campus in Indiana

In a decisive move that underscores the escalating stakes of the global artificial intelligence arms race, Meta Platforms has officially broken ground on a colossal $10 billion data center campus in Lebanon, Indiana. This facility, projected to support a staggering 1 gigawatt (GW) of capacity, marks a pivotal shift in hyperscale infrastructure, transitioning from traditional cloud storage needs to the immense power density required by next-generation AI models.

For the editors at Creati.ai, this development is not merely about construction metrics; it represents the physical manifestation of the "AI everywhere" strategy. As foundation models grow exponentially in size and complexity, the digital world requires a new caliber of physical engine room—one that Meta is now building in the heart of the American Midwest.

The Gigawatt Standard: Redefining AI Infrastructure

The Lebanon facility, located approximately 30 miles northwest of Indianapolis, serves as a bellwether for the industry's future. Historically, data centers were measured in tens or hundreds of megawatts. The shift to the "gigawatt scale" indicates that Meta is preparing for a future where AI inference and training workloads demand energy at the scale of small cities.

Rachel Peterson, Meta’s Vice President of Data Centers, emphasized that this project is designed with flexibility at its core. The infrastructure must simultaneously support the company's existing ecosystem—Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp—while providing the specialized compute environments necessary for training Llama models and powering future "personal superintelligence" agents.

This investment aligns with a broader industry trend where hyperscalers are securing land and power aggressively. However, Meta’s $10 billion commitment stands out as one of the largest single-site infrastructure investments in the sector's history. The campus will feature liquid-cooled hardware, a necessity for managing the thermal output of high-performance GPUs, ensuring that the facility remains efficient even under peak AI processing loads.

Economic Engine: Jobs and Community Integration

The sheer scale of the Lebanon project promises to reshape the local economy of Boone County. Beyond the technological implications, the construction and operation of the campus will generate significant employment opportunities. Meta has projected that the build-out phase will require a massive workforce, transitioning later to specialized operational roles.

The following table details the projected economic and operational metrics of the new campus:

Table 1: Meta Lebanon Data Center Key Metrics

Balancing Power Hunger with Sustainability

One of the most critical challenges facing the AI industry is the environmental cost of compute. Training a single large language model can consume gigawatt-hours of electricity, raising concerns about carbon footprints and grid strain. In response, Meta has pledged that the Lebanon campus will match 100% of its electricity use with clean energy.

The company is partnering with local utility providers, including Boone Power and the Wabash Valley Power Alliance, to integrate new renewable energy projects into the grid. This approach aims to ensure that the data center's massive demand does not displace power for local residents or spike consumer rates.

Furthermore, water usage—a contentious issue for data centers—is being addressed through closed-loop liquid cooling technology. This system is designed to minimize water evaporation, a significant improvement over traditional air-cooling towers. Meta has also committed to a "water positive" goal, intending to restore more water to the local watershed than the facility consumes, partly through partnerships with agricultural tech firms like Arable to improve irrigation efficiency in the region.

Why Indiana? The Midwest Tech Hub Narrative

The choice of Lebanon, Indiana, for this mega-campus is strategic. It is Meta’s second facility in the state, following a campus in Jeffersonville. Indiana has increasingly positioned itself as a favorable destination for tech infrastructure due to its stable energy grid, business-friendly tax incentives, and central location which offers low latency to major population centers across the Eastern and Central United States.

Governor Eric Holcomb and local officials have championed the "Silicon Heartland" vision, and securing a $10 billion anchor project from a member of the Magnificent Seven solidifies the state's status in the digital economy. For Meta, the location offers the expansive land required for a 1,000-acre campus and the ability to work closely with cooperative utilities to build custom power substations.

The Road Ahead

As construction crews break ground this week, the timeline for the facility remains aggressive. While specific completion dates for all phases have not been publicly fixed, the initial capacity is expected to come online within the next few years to meet the voracious demand for AI compute.

For the AI industry, the Lebanon data center is a clear signal: the era of constraints is ending, and the era of massive scale has begun. Meta is not just building a warehouse for servers; it is constructing the power plant for the next generation of artificial intelligence.