As U.S. civil rights groups launch a lawsuit against Elon Musk's artificial intelligence company xAI for using a large number of gas turbines in data centers in the southern United States, the company plans to continue to significantly expand the same type of equipment over the next three years. According to an initial public offering (IPO) document filed by SpaceX on Wednesday, xAI, its AI business unit, is expected to spend about $2.8 billion to purchase gas turbines for AI infrastructure, including an order worth about $2 billion specifically for "mobile gas turbines," which is at the center of the current litigation dispute.
Previously, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) filed a lawsuit in court, accusing xAI of operating dozens of unlicensed gas turbines near a data center in Mississippi, further worsening the air quality in the area, which is already one of the most polluted areas in the United States. The group asked the court to issue an injunction against the use of these units. Public information shows that regulators have only given xAI licenses for 15 gas turbines, but until a few weeks ago, the company actually had 46 units in operation.
Environmental concerns center on the large amounts of nitrogen oxide emissions these gas turbines can produce. According to reports, several types of units currently used by xAI can potentially emit more than 2,000 tons of nitrogen oxides per year. This type of gas is an important component of smog and ozone pollution that induces health risks such as asthma.
In response to licensing issues, xAI's defense is that its equipment is a "mobile" gas turbine - that is, it remains on the trailer chassis it was transported on, and can therefore be operated without an emissions permit for up to a year. Mississippi agrees with this explanation, arguing that such “mobile generating units” are not covered by state licensing regulations. However, relevant regulations at the federal level clearly require that gas turbines of a certain size, whether installed on trailers or not, should be included in the air pollution regulatory system. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) determined earlier this year that xAI's operating practices violated federal air pollution regulations.
In its latest IPO filing, SpaceX also acknowledged this legal and regulatory risk. The document states that the company is currently "heavily dependent on natural gas and gas turbine technology" for data center operations. If the court issues an injunction or the regulatory authority revokes the existing license, "it will have an adverse impact on our AI business." Even so, xAI is still betting on continuing to expand the computing infrastructure with gas turbines as its core, highlighting the increasingly acute contradiction between energy and environmental protection regulation in the context of the current AI competition.