Fluidstack has started site work on the $4 billion first phase of an artificial intelligence data center campus covering more than 1,100 acres of unincorporated Cameron County, Texas, near Rio Hondo. Cameron County issued the worksite permit on 10 September 2026. The New York based developer is aiming to complete phase one by mid 2028 and expects the project to generate more than 2,500 construction jobs.
The campus is located east of FM 509 and west of FM 106, between Gomez Road and FM 1596, approximately four miles southwest of Rio Hondo and directly east of Valley International Airport. It is the first data center project in Cameron County to progress from proposal into physical construction, arriving as the county continues a debate over water use and Texas maintains a statewide freeze on grid connections for large computing loads.
What Cameron County Actually Permitted
The document issued on 10 September is a worksite permit rather than a building permit. County officials said it authorizes land clearing and grading, utility installation, streets and parking areas, retention ponds, and other stormwater infrastructure, while additional permits will be required before any data center building can be constructed. The distinction is important when interpreting the groundbreaking as approval for the entire campus. Earthworks across a 1,100 acre property can continue for months before a single data hall is enclosed.
County Judge Eddie Treviño Jr. characterized the approval as a ministerial action rather than an endorsement, explaining that the county is required under state law to issue a permit once a business satisfies all requirements. Texas counties do not have general zoning authority, a limitation the commissioners court addressed in a resolution adopted on 7 April 2026 calling for protections related to water supply, grid reliability, drainage, roads, agricultural land, and taxpayer funded infrastructure. The same resolution took a specific technical stance by opposing open-loop evaporative cooling systems that consume large quantities of potable water. Precinct 3 Commissioner David A. Garza, whose precinct includes the site, said in the company’s announcement that Fluidstack is doing it right.
The Number Fluidstack Has Not Published
Fluidstack has not revealed the campus’s critical IT load, and no anchor tenant has been identified. Both details are unusual for a project of this scale, and both have implications for regulation in Texas.
A potential benchmark can be drawn from the company’s recent transactions. TeraWulf’s October 2025 investor materials for the Abernathy joint venture in the Texas Panhandle, a 168 MW critical IT load facility leased to Fluidstack, placed total project cost at $8 million to $10 million per critical megawatt. Applying that benchmark to a $4 billion first phase suggests a critical IT load somewhere between 400 and 500 MW. The calculation is indicative rather than definitive, since the $4 billion figure may include land, substation construction, and transmission contributions that are treated differently in the Abernathy benchmark. Even the lower end, however, would put the Cameron County project at more than six times the threshold that triggers Texas’ strictest requirements.
Senate Bill 6, signed on 20 June 2025, covers new or expanded interconnections where demand at a single site exceeds 75 MW. The framework requires demonstrated site control, disclosure of parallel interconnection applications elsewhere in Texas, disclosure of behind-the-meter backup generation capable of serving half the load, a screening study fee of at least $100,000, and curtailment capability for loads energized after 31 December 2025. The Public Utility Commission published its draft implementing rule on 12 March 2026, adding quarterly site study updates and disclosure of local permitting progress to the intermediate agreement a developer must execute before ERCOT begins an interconnection study.
Then came the pause. On 3 August 2026, Governor Greg Abbott instructed the PUCT and ERCOT to audit every data center progressing through the interconnection process, with the audit required before any project advances and connections denied to projects that fail. Fluidstack says the campus complies with directives from the governor, PUCT, ERCOT, and the county, and that it will finance its own transmission and electrical infrastructure through AEP Texas. Head of public affairs Kate Franko said the company will pay our own way: our energy, our infrastructure, our water. Fluidstack does not appear, however, among the companies publicly identified by the governor’s office in its compliance announcements through August 2026, a list that includes Amazon, Google, Microsoft, Meta, Stack Infrastructure, Anthropic and Nightpeak Energy. Anthropic is Fluidstack’s largest disclosed counterparty, but its developer is not included on the list.
Water, and the Figure That Defused One Fight
Water is the issue that brought this project before a city commission in a municipality where it is not being constructed. At the Harlingen City Commission meeting on 2 September 2026, Fluidstack representatives said the campus would initially use approximately 50,000 gallons of potable water per day during construction, falling to around 7,000 gallons per day once operational. Water will be supplied by East Rio Hondo Water Supply Corporation, whose general manager Brian E. Macmanus confirmed the service request. The cooling system is closed loop, using a tank the company says holds less than an Olympic sized swimming pool, which is filled once and then recycled.
Those figures directly address the county’s April resolution. An operating demand of 7,000 gallons per day is minimal compared with agricultural and municipal consumption in a Lower Rio Grande Valley dealing with drought, and it distinguishes this project from the evaporative cooling systems opposed by the commissioners court. The construction figure is seven times higher but temporary. The City of Rio Hondo, which shares its name with the water corporation, issued a statement on 1 September distancing itself from the project, saying it has no agreements with any data center developer and that the site lies outside its jurisdiction.
The $27 Million That Left Harlingen
The more significant unresolved issue is drainage. Fluidstack had sought permission from Harlingen to discharge stormwater into a 90 foot wide city owned canal serving the airport, with a proposed package involving approximately $7 million to widen the channel and another $20 million for city infrastructure. Commissioners tabled the request on 2 September and required the company to conduct a public town hall before returning for another vote. Eight days later, the county issued the worksite permit and Fluidstack said it would pursue an alternative discharge route.
Mayor Norma Sepulveda said the city did not have the authority to stop the project and said she had been informed that the $20 million would instead go to Cameron County. Her concern is focused not on the campus itself but on the channel improvements: city officials were told on 2 September that the proposed widening and detention measures could have helped mitigate flooding at Valley International Airport during the March 2025 floods. Cameron County’s own 10 September release confirms neither the $20 million transfer nor the ultimate stormwater discharge location. Reporting has variously described the alternative as a stormwater or wastewater arrangement. Until the county releases the agreement, there is no publicly documented outfall for stormwater from a 1,100 acre impervious-surface development located upstream of a regional airport.
No Tenant, No Backstop, No Disclosed Debt
Other major Fluidstack projects in Texas have followed a similar structure, but Cameron County has not. At Abernathy, TeraWulf owns 51 percent of the joint venture, the 25 year hosting agreement represents approximately $9.5 billion in contracted revenue, and Google backstops $1.3 billion of Fluidstack’s lease obligations to support project debt. A separate 10 year agreement with Cipher Mining for 244 MW in Texas carries a $1.4 billion Google backstop. A similar model supports Hut 8’s $10 billion River Bend campus in Louisiana, where Fluidstack is the credit supported tenant rather than the developer.
In Cameron County, Fluidstack appears to be developing the project on its own account. No lease, credit enhancement, project financing, or tenant has been announced. The company raised $830 million in a Series A at a $7.5 billion valuation in July 2026, led by Situational Awareness, representing roughly one-fifth of the announced phase one cost. It is also the delivery partner for Anthropic’s $50 billion United States data center programme, while its earlier work at the Lake Mariner campus in New York advanced through phased delivery supported by Google credit. How the Cameron County phase will ultimately be capitalized remains the biggest unanswered question surrounding the groundbreaking.
Land Is Cheap, Power Is Not
The site’s selection rationale is apparent from its size. Fluidstack is distributing an implied 400 to 500 MW across more than 1,100 acres, or less than half a megawatt per acre. By comparison, the campus DC BLOX is developing at Conyers in Georgia places 216 MW of Georgia Power supply across 72 acres alongside 750,000 square feet of building space, equivalent to nearly 3 MW per acre. Metro Atlanta land encourages vertical density. Border-region farmland does not, and the additional acreage provides room for substations, setbacks, retention infrastructure, and future phases without requiring another land assembly.
Fluidstack is not the only developer to recognize that advantage. UK based Eneus Energy has been pursuing a 1,785 acre site in the same county for an RGV campus with a potential $14 billion capital cost, the proposal that originally prompted the commissioners court to develop its resolution. At the state level, Texas trails only Virginia, with at least 248 data center projects in the pipeline. Cameron County has gone from having no data centers to being approached by two of the largest proposals along the border in less than two years, while retaining no zoning authority over either.
Key Project Data
- Project Name: Fluidstack Cameron County AI Data Center Campus
- Location: Unincorporated Cameron County, Texas, east of FM 509 and west of FM 106, about four miles southwest of Rio Hondo
- Project Value: $4 billion for phase one (Fluidstack, 10 September 2026)
- Site Area: More than 1,100 acres
- Developer and Owner: Fluidstack
- Critical IT Load: Not publicly disclosed
- Cooling: Closed loop, single fill, air cooled; tank volume stated as less than an Olympic sized swimming pool
- Water Supply: East Rio Hondo Water Supply Corporation, approximately 50,000 gallons per day during construction falling to around 7,000 gallons per day during operations
- Power: AEP Texas transmission, with Fluidstack funding electrical infrastructure
- Permitting Status: County worksite permit issued 10 September 2026; building permits outstanding; ERCOT interconnection subject to the statewide audit directed 3 August 2026
- Construction Start: Site work, autumn 2026
- Phase One Completion: Targeted mid 2028 (Fluidstack)
- Jobs: More than 2,500 construction, several hundred permanent
- Incentives: No local property tax abatement or county incentive requested or received
Project Team
- Developer: Fluidstack
- Permitting Authority: Cameron County
- Electricity Provider: AEP Texas
- Water Supply: East Rio Hondo Water Supply Corporation
- Grid Regulators: ERCOT and the Public Utility Commission of Texas
- Main Contractor: Not yet disclosed
- Design and Engineering: Not yet disclosed
- Anchor Tenant: Not yet disclosed
- Project Financing: Not yet disclosed
Frequently Asked Questions
Is the Fluidstack data center in Harlingen?
No. The campus is located in unincorporated Cameron County, northeast of Harlingen and approximately four miles southwest of Rio Hondo. Harlingen’s only involvement was a proposed stormwater discharge agreement, which commissioners tabled on 2 September 2026.
Does the worksite permit mean construction of the buildings can start?
No. The permit covers clearing, grading, utilities, streets, parking, and retention ponds. Cameron County has said additional permits are required before the data center buildings themselves can be constructed.
Can the campus connect to the Texas grid yet?
Not automatically. Governor Abbott directed the PUCT and ERCOT on 3 August 2026 to audit all data centers in the interconnection process before projects proceed, with projects that fail the audit subject to connection denial.
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