An aerial image of xAI’s data center in southwest Memphis. Local residents are protesting against the facility’s use of gas-powered turbines.
Last summer, an abandoned factory in southwest Memphis got a new life courtesy of the world’s richest man. Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence company xAI moved in to transform this unprepossessing building into the “world’s largest supercomputer.”
Musk named it Colossus and said it was the “most powerful AI training system in the world.” It was sold locally as a source of jobs, tax dollars and a key addition to the “Digital Delta” — the move to make Memphis a hotspot for advanced technology.
“This is just the beginning,” xAI said on its website; the company already has plans for a second facility in the city.
But for some residents in nearby Boxtown, a majority Black, economically-disadvantaged community that has long endured industrial pollution, xAI’s facility represents yet another threat to their health.
AI is immensely power-hungry, and Musk’s company installed dozens of gas-powered turbines, known to produce a cocktail of toxic pollutants. The company currently has no air permits, appearing to rely on a loophole for temporary turbines — but environmental groups say the exemption does not apply, and residents are angry.
“Our health was never considered, the safety of our communities was never, ever considered,” said Sarah Gladney, who lives 3 miles from the facility and suffers from a lung condition.
This part of Memphis, home to 17 other polluting facilities — including an oil refinery, steel plant and gas-fired power plant — is used to fighting for clean air.
This time, however, not only are they up against the world’s richest man, who happens to be one of President Donald Trump’s closest advisors, but it’s happening as the Trump administration takes an ax to pollution legislation, slashes environmental justice programs and throws its full-throated support behind AI.
What’s unfolding in Memphis should be a warning to other communities, said Erika Sugarmon, a commissioner of Shelby County, which encompasses Memphis and the surrounding area. “All these different safeguards are being taken away,” she told CNN. “So where do you go?”
The race for AI
The new Memphis facility is part of Musk’s quest to dominate AI, providing computing power to xAI’s chatbot, Grok, which the company promotes as an “anti-woke” version of OpenAI’s ChatGPT. It has been under fire for loose guardrails, including allowing users to create Nazi Mickey Mouse images.
Memphis Mayor Paul Young has thrown his support behind xAI’s arrival, emphasizing benefits including the promise of hundreds of high-paying jobs and around $30 million in tax revenues in the first year alone.
“What we are looking at is an opportunity to completely transform our economy,” Young said. It’s “game changing,” he told CNN.
Others see it very differently.
Some local lawmakers say they were kept in the dark about the facility’s arrival, leaving them scrambling for information.
State Rep. Justin Pearson, a Democrat who lives 3 miles from the facility, said he was blindsided. His initial concern was how it would be powered. “Our grid is already not stable enough” and the last three winters have seen rolling blackouts, he told CNN.
It turned out the answer is partly grid power. The facility receives 150 megawatts from the local public utility Memphis Light, Gas and Water — enough to power around 100,000 homes. MLGW said it had done an impact study to ensure this would not affect power availability and reliability for consumers. xAI is now awaiting approval for a further 150 megawatts.
But what really spiked Pearson’s concerns were the turbines that started appearing at the facility last summer.
xAI has applied for permits for 15 turbines but they have yet to be approved.
Gas-powered turbines produce pollutants, including nitrogen oxides, a key component of ozone pollution — also called smog — which can cause asthma attacks and chest pain and, in the longer-term, is linked to decreased lung function and premature death.
They also generate the carcinogen formaldehyde and tiny air pollution particles so small they can pass through lungs into people’s bloodstream.
It’s a big concern for a region already grappling with the impacts of air pollution. The cancer risk from industrial sources in southwest Memphis is 4.1 times higher than the EPA’s acceptable risk, according to a ProPublica analysis. Shelby county has an F in air quality for ozone levels from the American Lung Association and the highest rates of children hospitalized for asthma in Tennessee.
Aerial images taken by the Southern Environmental Law Center and South Wings, an organization of volunteer pilots, in March showed xAI had 35 turbines at the facility.
These can generate a total of 420 megawatts, equivalent to a “medium- to large-sized power plant,” said Patrick Anderson, a senior attorney at SELC. They can produce an up to 2,000 tons of nitrogen oxide pollution every year, which would make xAI one of the biggest sources in the county, according to SELC calculations.
Aerial pictures taken in April, this time with a thermal imaging camera, showed 33 turbines were producing heat, suggesting they were operating, Anderson told CNN.
An aerial photo of the xAI facility taken with a thermal imaging camera showing heat coming from the turbines, in April 2025.
What has inflamed the community further is xAI’s lack of air permits.
It appears the company relied on a loophole which allows temporary turbines in one location for less than a year to operate without a permit.
The SELC, however, argues xAI’s turbines don’t fall within a permit exemption because of their size and the pollution they produce. “Our position is (xAI is) without a permit, they should not be operating,” Anderson said.
In January, months after starting operations, xAI applied to the Shelby County Health Department for permits for 15 turbines. A health department spokesperson told CNN the application was currently under review and all community feedback would be “carefully considered.”
Twelve of the remaining 20 turbines were removed in May, and the rest will go in the future, said Mayor Young, although the timeline is unclear.
The Greater Memphis Chamber of Commerce said the turbines for which permits have been requested “will achieve industry-leading emission standards” once they are equipped with pollution reduction technologies.
For Rep. Pearson, however, the situation is bewildering. “It’s an actual gas plant in the middle of a neighborhood and you don’t need any permitting?” he said. “Something has failed drastically and significantly with our system of checks and balances.”
