OpenAI Pledges Up to 1-Gigawatt Demand Reduction at Georgia Site

A new OpenAI agreement gives Georgia Power room to lower the planned Project Camellia campus’s grid draw by as much as 1,000 megawatts when the system is strained.

The arrangement is demand response: Georgia Power can reduce electricity use at the site when the grid is under pressure. It does not create a new power source or mean electricity will flow from the campus to homes. OpenAI says the maximum reduction is comparable to average demand from about 700,000 households, a measure of consumption avoided rather than homes supplied. Project Camellia is still in development, so the reduction commitment has not yet been demonstrated in operation.

OpenAI announced Grid Protectors on Monday, Nov. 2, describing it as a national effort to arrange electricity reductions at future campuses. Project Camellia, in Effingham County, is the program’s starting site. OpenAI said later commitments will be developed with utilities, regulators and policymakers and may differ by location.

The company also said demand adjustments cannot take the place of investment in generation and transmission. It has not identified an on-site generation or storage system for the Georgia campus. The project adds to a broader U.S. discussion over power-market pressure from AI data-center demand.

OpenAI’s plan calls for 3.2 gigawatts of electricity to reach the site in phases from 2028 to 2032. A separate, 25-year Georgia Power service agreement covers up to 3,210 megawatts; that figure describes service capacity, while the Grid Protectors pledge is a maximum reduction in the campus’s draw. The full contract was filed as a trade secret.

The service contract was deemed approved Aug. 26 after Georgia Public Service Commission (PSC) staff said it would not object. PSC staff and Georgia Power said the agreement complied with commission orders and was designed to protect customers with loads below 100 megawatts.

On Aug. 12, the Natural Resources Defense Council, Sierra Club Georgia Chapter and Southern Alliance for Clean Energy urged staff to object unless stronger protections addressed the risk of costs shifting to existing customers. OpenAI said: “Families and small businesses should not be asked to subsidize a compute campus’s electricity needs.”

OpenAI said it will share further Grid Protectors commitments as they are finalized.