Nathan Ough's $500 billion promise came wrapped in red tape...
The Canadian businessman co-founded VoltaGrid with a simple goal. Texas energy companies couldn't count on utility grid access.
So Ough's company would drive trucks to a job site with generators and supporting equipment... then deliver power where and when it was needed.
It was a solid business for years. Ough was happy to call the Texas energy industry his customer base.
Then, a much bigger buyer came calling...
Stargate is a $500 billion data-center infrastructure project...
It's supposed to cement the U.S. as the dominant force in AI development. It's a joint venture between some of the biggest tech, AI, and investment companies.
The project was met with much fanfare. On the first full day of his second term, President Donald Trump brought OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, Oracle (ORCL) Chair Larry Ellison, and Masayoshi Son – CEO of $140 billion investment group SoftBank (SFTBY) – onstage to inaugurate Stargate and highlight its urgency.
Stargate is in the realm of the largest infrastructure efforts in U.S. history. It's right up there with the interstate highway system.
The early sites are in Texas. Several are already in development or up and running. It's expected to use 10 gigawatts ("GW") of capacity once all is said and done.
If most data centers have the horsepower of a standard sedan, Stargate is a Gerald R. Ford-class nuclear aircraft carrier. At the time of its grand announcement, it was larger than all existing shared U.S. data centers... combined.
That's the kind of firepower the country needs to remain the center of the AI universe. But when the agencies responsible for approving new energy projects saw what was being promised, they had one message for Stargate...
Get in line.
This build-out is running into the exact same issues as every other energy project...
Utilities, permitting, equipment lead times, and local approvals... it all takes time. In many regions, the grid is strained even before new data center loads arrive.
A project can have land, capital, and customers – and still sit idle, waiting for a connection.
The process has slowed to a crawl. Back in 2008, it took less than two years to connect to power after filing a request. It was up to three years by 2015. And by 2023, it was five years.
If that pace holds, some of today's projects won't be "lights on" until 2030 or later.
But Ough has a solution...
In Texas, VoltaGrid's trucks and equipment were supporting the fracking industry. (Fracking involves injecting a mixture of fluids and sediment into shale to extract natural gas.)
The folks at Stargate asked Ough to bring his trucks... and leave the fracking equipment. He'll provide something called "behind the meter" power.
Put simply, VoltaGrid will generate electricity on-site and feed it straight into the facility.
Behind-the-meter power is a way to circumvent the long wait times that come with grid connection. In practice, it often looks like a "microgrid" built next to the data center.
Microgrids can bring a data-center campus online years earlier than a traditional interconnection... so AI development can start now instead of later.
This solution is spreading fast. Just last year, Ough hosted executives from oil majors like ExxonMobil (XOM) and ConocoPhillips (COP)... senior officials from Oracle... and engineers from data-center construction companies for an Italian dinner.
Now, VoltaGrid is under contract to power one of Oracle's data centers for $1 billion per year.
There are at least 46 behind-the-meter data centers in the U.S...
About 90% of these projects were launched in 2025 alone. And they have a combined 56 GW of planned capacity. That's roughly 30% of the total planned capacity for these sites.
As more of these data centers pop up, companies like VoltaGrid are going to rake in cash.
AI is in the thick of an energy bottleneck. And that bottleneck is moving more power behind the grid... and next to the data centers.
And the companies that can help support this behind-the-meter build-out are set to surge.
I've identified four promising players in this hidden corner of the market. Their stocks are already breaking out. As investors catch on to this trend, I predict shares could soar 2 times... 3 times... even 5 times from here.
I share all the details in an urgent briefing – including how to access my latest research for 50% off. Full story here.
To profit in today's market, you don't have to predict who's going to win the AI race...
You just have to find the stocks helping AI win.
Regards,
Joel Litman
May 18, 2026
