A group of U.S. and Japanese companies formed the Portsmouth Consortium on March 21, 2026. The group will develop a 9.2 GW natural gas power project at the Department of Energy site in Piketon, Ohio.
Consortium members include SoftBank Group, GE Vernova, Kinder Morgan, Hitachi, Goldman Sachs, and MUFG Bank. The facility is designed to power a new large-scale AI data center development.
The initiative operates under the U.S.-Japan Strategic Trade and Investment Agreement. The U.S. Department of Energy officially announced the project on March 20.
This investment underscores the immense electricity demand from the artificial intelligence industry. It creates a long-term demand signal for natural gas despite market volatility from the Middle East crisis.