Meta Seeks to Harness Space Solar Power for Data Centers

Meta is seeking more long-term sources of electricity for AI data centers. The company said on Monday that it has reached an agreement with Overview Energy, securing priority access to up to 1 gigawatt of space-based solar power capacity in the future, roughly equivalent to the power output of a nuclear reactor.

The core of this agreement is not Meta immediately acquiring a new batch of power, but rather preemptively securing a power source that is still under validation. Overview Energy's vision is to collect sunlight with satellites orbiting the Earth and then transmit the energy back to ground-based receiving facilities to power the electrical grid.

The appeal of space-based solar power lies in its stability. It seeks to bypass the fluctuations in power generation caused by weather, day and night, and seasonal changes, which correspond well with AI data centers' need for continuous electricity. However, this technology is still a significant distance from commercialization—Overview Energy is still developing and testing the underlying technology, planning a first orbital demonstration in 2028, and expecting commercial power supply by 2030.

Before space-based solar power is validated, Meta is still relying on more traditional energy paths. The company views natural gas as a more stable and reliable form of energy and is supporting the construction of ten new gas-fired power plants for a large AI data center park in Louisiana. This forms two lines of Meta's current energy strategy: in the short term, relying on more controllable gas electricity, and in the long term, betting on new schemes such as space-based solar power. The former addresses the immediate need for electricity in data centers, while the latter attempts to reduce the constraints of future AI expansion on ground-based energy conditions.