[Composite image: DI Studio; Sources: Vitalii Gulenok/ dikobraziy/ Stock SKN/ istockphoto]

Dallas-based CyrusOne, a leading data center owner, developer and operator, is partnering with California-based Eolian L.P.  on a “collaborative infrastructure deployment” for a new data center campus, DFW7, currently under construction in Fort Worth.

CyrusOne and Eolian’s “innovative collaboration” aims to co-locate large-scale data center capacity at an existing grid-scale battery energy storage site. The Fort Worth campus will provide new digital infrastructure capacity for hyperscaler and enterprise companies, said the partners, who added that they’ve achieved “accelerated time-to-market” for the site by leveraging existing high-voltage transmission infrastructure and adjacent substation capacity. 

Burlingame, California-based Eolian has developed and operates battery energy storage systems (BESS) across the U.S. In 2023, the company identified an opportunity for CyrusOne to deploy new data center capacity at an accelerated rate by utilizing existing high-voltage infrastructure at Chisholm Grid, a 100MW BESS site seven miles northwest of downtown Fort Worth. Chisholm Grid began commercial operations in the ERCOT market in 2021.

The companies then collaborated on what they call “a novel structure,” enabling CyrusOne to break ground last April with an approach focused on optimizing the use of existing grid infrastructure and substations while compressing the timeline for datacenter deployment in one of America’s fastest-growing digital infrastructure markets.

CyrusOne CEO Eric Schwartz said his customers’ continued growth “drives demand for new capacity.”

“Leveraging the existing infrastructure at the Fort Worth campus enables CyrusOne to deliver large-scale capacity to customers beginning in 2026,” he added in a statement.  “CyrusOne is accelerating time-to-market for our customers by working creatively with Eolian as an established energy project developer and operator with existing sites in locations that would be difficult to replicate.”

As part of the collaboration with CyrusOne, Eolian said it will modernize and upgrade one of Texas’ first utility-scale BESS systems while the existing infrastructure will provide energy supply to the initial phases of digital infrastructure.

“This project is about problem-solving—using existing infrastructure intelligently to deliver speed to power and speed to datacenter growth,” Eolian CEO Aaron Zubaty said in the statement. “By developing flexible capacity resources at highly networked grid locations, we can enable hyperscale growth without duplicating facilities, expanding transmission, or utilizing additional industrial real estate.”

“This is exactly how the grid should evolve—efficiently, quickly, and in direct response to real load growth,” Zubaty added. “Projects like DFW7 prove that the fastest path forward is not necessarily only to construct transmission infrastructure, but also first to more efficiently use what we have already built.”

The partners said they aim for the campus to support AI-driven compute growth, data center deployment, and long-term grid reliability in North Texas.

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