$3.6 billion AI data center campus planned for Rapides Parish

State officials announced Tuesday another large data center is coming to Louisiana with construction planned in Rapides Parish. 

Applied Digital Corp. plans to develop a $3.6 billion, 300-acre artificial intelligence campus known as Delta Forge 1 in the town of Boyce, according to a news release from Louisiana Economic Development. The company specializes in building data centers and offers digital computing infrastructure for cryptocurrency companies, according to its website.

The new campus will directly support 200 full-time jobs, and the development will create over 1,000 temporary construction jobs at peak construction, state officials said.

Delta Forge 1 will initially include two facilities requiring 300 megawatts of electricity. Cleco will supply the electricity, though officials and the utility have not yet mentioned any plans for a new power plant. A 300-megawatt load is roughly equivalent to the electric load of 200,000 homes running during summer peak temperatures, according to statistics from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

Site development for the data center campus began in January, with initial operations expected to begin in mid-2027. 

Applied Digital will not have to pay Louisiana sales tax on qualifying purchases or leases of data center equipment thanks to a carve-out lawmakers enacted through Act 730 of the 2024 Regular Legislative Session, the news release stated. 

Tuesday’s announcement marks the latest in a series of data center developments in Louisiana. They include Meta’s $30 billion Hyperion data center in Richland Parish, Hut 8’s $10 billion AI campus in West Feliciana Parish and Amazon’s $12 billion campuses planned for Caddo and Bossier parishes.