PE backing both sides of data center boom, new research in NYC

New York, NY— As AI and data centers drive a new wave of electricity demand, private equity firms are increasingly positioned across both the data centers creating that demand and the energy infrastructure needed to power them.

The Private Equity Stakeholder Project (PESP) will bring new research on this growing overlap to Climate Week NYC, where its climate and energy team will meet with investors, advocates, policymakers, researchers, and community partners.

Private equity moves across the AI energy supply chain
Private equity firms now back half of the top 10 U.S. data center companies. According to S&P Global, private equity investment in U.S. data centers reached $45.7 billion in 2025, accounting for roughly 72% of total investment in the sector. Among the most active firms in the sector are Blackstone, BlackRock, Brookfield, KKR, EQT, DigitalBridge, and Stonepeak.

The investment is increasingly extending beyond data centers themselves. This summer, major data center firm DigitalBridge announced it was acquiring ArcLight Capital Partners, a private equity energy infrastructure firm with approximately 20.8 GW of power generation capacity. DigitalBridge is already invested in data center companies representing more than 1.3 GW of active U.S. IT capacity, while ArcLight owns an extensive portfolio of coal and gas plants, pipelines, and other energy assets.

ArcLight owns stakes in Pennsylvania’s Keystone and Conemaugh coal plants, which had been expected to retire by 2028 but now have a pathway to remain open until 2032 amid concerns about electricity supply and growing demand tied to planned data center development.

Other private equity firms are expanding across multiple parts of the same system. In Ohio, EQT-backed EdgeConneX is developing data centers alongside gas-fired generation to power them, including a proposed 800 MW gas plant in Ashville, while EQT is also moving to acquire AES, whose U.S. utility operations include AES Ohio.

The data center buildout comes on top of an already extensive private equity footprint in fossil fuels. The newly released 2026 Private Equity Climate Risks Scorecard found that the energy portfolios of just 20 major private equity firms produce an estimated 1.5 gigatons of greenhouse gas emissions annually, a footprint that would rank fifth globally compared with countries’ fossil fuel emissions.

What PESP is bringing to Climate Week
“Private equity is playing a bigger role in decisions about how we power our economy, from the utilities people depend on every day to the AI rush driving huge new electricity demand,” said Ashlee Thomas, Climate and Energy Director at PESP. “At Climate Week, we want to make sure private equity is part of the conversation about the energy transition. That includes how utility ownership affects rates and reliability, how the AI boom is keeping fossil fuel infrastructure alive, whether private equity investments match the climate commitments of the pensions and other institutions investing with them, and what these decisions mean for workers and communities.”

Thomas and PESP Senior Researcher and Campaign Coordinator Nichole Heil will be in New York during Climate Week and available for interviews and background conversations on private equity’s role in data centers and AI infrastructure, utilities, fossil fuel investments, institutional investors, and the energy transition.

Those interested in connecting with PESP during Climate Week can contact Ashlee Thomas at ashlee.thomas@pestakeholder.org.