AI vs AI
It's still a guess … Who's ahead in our poll … And secrets in the Cloud.
Project Blue is the soundtrack to every civic conversation in Tucson these days — an endless buzz of “Who’s really behind it?” and “Why the fortress-level secrecy?”
The company behind the proposed 290-acre data center campus wants massive amounts of reclaimed water and a hefty slice of Tucson Electric Power’s capacity.
Yet the public has no clue who that company is.
Elected officials claim NDAs have left them in the dark, while a few business insiders wink that they “know the name” of the company but won’t spill.
These massive data centers are necessary because of the AI boom — which gave us an idea: Could we use AI to uncover the secret of which AI company is trying to build Project Blue?
So we asked ChatGPT to play detective.1
For us, it’s a no-lose proposition:
If the bot misses, we get to poke fun at AI’s blind spots.
If it nails the culprit, Project Blue has to explain why an off-the-shelf language model can unravel a secret that’s supposedly watertight.
And even just having AI guess which company is behind Project Blue is an interesting experiment that allows us to explain the range of companies that might possibly be interested in such a massive undertaking and why.
So who does AI think is coming to Tucson?
ChatGPT thinks STACK Infrastructure, which is fully owned by the company funding Project Blue, will be the operator.
Notice we didn’t say end-user. STACK runs on a different model, acting as a landlord for the end users instead of large AI companies owning and operating the data centers themselves.
ChatGPT’s list of other potential end users included Amazon Web Services, CoreWeave and OpenAI (ironically the company behind ChatGPT).
The answer depends on which AI model you ask and how you ask the question.
With STACK operating as the landlord, we could see any of the above end users come to the Old Pueblo.
We know from public records that the private group financing the multi-billion-dollar project is Blue Owl Capital. (Hence the name Project Blue — or at least that’s the speculation).
STACK is a subsidiary of Blue Owl Capital.
Another Blue Owl subsidiary, Beale Infrastructure, is listed in county documents as the developer of the 290-acre site.
A recent SEC filing confirms that both STACK and Beale are portfolio companies under Blue Owl’s digital infrastructure strategy — Beale for development, and STACK for operations.
There’s a documented track record in Virginia, Chicago, and Phoenix: Blue Owl finances, Beale (or another developer) handles land development and resource entitlements, and then STACK steps in to develop and operate the build-to-suit data centers.
To be clear — we don’t know it’s STACK.
But the world’s smartest AI model thinks it’s highly likely.
And we may find out for sure next week if the City of Tucson lists STACK Infrastructure in its pre-annexation agreement.
However, that wouldn’t necessarily end the secrecy about who’s actually going to use those data centers.
If STACK is the landlord, they aren’t required to announce their clients.
One possible client might be Amazon, which also ranked high on ChatGPT’s list of potential end users.
The world’s largest retailer has a track record of secrecy. An Amazon NDA with local officials in Spotsylvania, Virginia, prevented them from revealing daily water demand for a similar project.
And that’s the crux of the issue: Immense secrecy with our most precious resources — our water supply, the air we breathe and the electricity that keeps the AC running in the summer.
For seasoned journalists who have gone to one too many planning and zoning hearings, the lengths the developers of Project Blue have gone to keep their secrets is unparalleled.
The Pima County Board of Supervisors never even learned who they really sold the 290 acres to last month.
STACK-ing up
So how does STACK stack up when it comes to responsible use of water and energy in its water-and energy-hungry data centers?
Before we dive into STACK Infrastructure’s on-the-ground record, one last friendly reminder: This is ChatGPT’s best guess at who’s behind Project Blue. It’s a plausible and logical guess — but not a definitive call.
Officially, STACK Infrastructure aims to be reliant on 100 percent renewable energy (including a preference for reclaimed, rather than potable, water), which aligns with public statements from private-sector reps of Project Blue, as well as city and county officials.
In practice, though, the company has occasionally run afoul of environmental regulations in other communities.
In Oregon, STACK was fined by the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality for running 49 diesel generators — used for emergency backup power — for nearly two years on an expired air permit. The civil penalty order called it a “serious violation.”
In Virginia, STACK convinced the Culpeper Town Council earlier this year to relax noise standards they had agreed to just a year prior.
We may find out next week if the City of Tucson lists STACK Infrastructure in its pre-annexation agreement. If STACK is the landlord, they aren’t required to announce their clients.
But due to company NDA’s, the community might never find out who the clients are. Besides, the client is secondary to the actual owner-operator of the facility.
In the next month, Tucson will decide on a multi-billion-dollar economic development controversy, fill a vacant seat in Congress, and hold elections for city council.
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If Tucson Agenda readers were the only ones voting, then Adelita Grijalva would win the Democratic primary in Congressional District 7 by a pretty wide margin.
We asked readers yesterday who they voted for (or planned to vote for) in the CD7 primary.
The survey is, of course, totally unscientific. Our sample size so far is just 81 people, our universe skews to highly informed voters, and we have no real methodology to speak of.
But right now, Grijalva is coming in at 41% of the vote, followed by Deja Foxx at 27%.
It looks like all the money Daniel Hernandez raised for his campaign isn’t doing much for Agenda readers. He’s in a distant third place with 5%, while Jose Malvido has 2% and Patrick Harris has 1%.
Feel like manipulating this poll? Share today’s edition with your friends!
You could make Foxx surge past Grijalva or give Hernandez a bump into double-digits.
There’s still time to participate. We’ll keep the survey open through Friday.
Changing tack: The Pima County Sheriff’s Department is no longer tracking when deputies ask federal immigration officers for help, the Arizona Luminaria’s John Washington reports. Since 2018, the department was supposed to track those requests, but a records request from the Luminaria showed nothing since mid-2023. Sheriff Chris Nanos said the policy was used by his predecessor to justify getting federal money for Operation Stonegarden, but Pima County no longer participates in that program.
Budget dreams: Substacker Robert Robb took a close look at the numbers in the newly approved state budget and they don’t look good. The state is projected to spend $880 million more than it collects next year. But lawmakers found a way to set aside $2 million to study and test flying cars, the Arizona Republic’s Mary Jo Pitzl reports. Sen. David Farnsworth, a Republican from Mesa, says flying cars are going to be the next big thing. First, they want to figure out how to make “vertiports” and find the best spots for charging stations.
“We all watched ‘The Jetsons’ years ago," he said, referring to a 1960s television show where the characters jetted around in flying vehicles. "Most who have been impatient have wondered: ‘Why hasn’t that happened yet?’”
Balance of power: Residents in the area near the Hermosa mine in the Patagonia Mountains are concerned their groundwater supplies will drop, KJZZ’s Alisa Reznick reports. The mining company South32 is trying to nail down agreements with property owners on a well monitoring program, but residents say those agreements give South32 too much power over their water.
Helpful tools: The Arizona Luminaria is churning out voter guides to help you get through the Tucson City Council primary elections. Their most recent one details the issues in Ward 5 and the candidates who are trying to fill the seat left vacant by longtime Councilman Richard Fimbres’ resignation.
That’s a lot of cash: In yet another financial wrinkle in Arizona’s school voucher program, parents who use vouchers for their kids are sitting on top of $440 million in unused voucher money, 12News’ Craig Harris reports. Apparently, the parents are planning to use that money for college, including 10 accounts with more than $200,000, which led Gov. Katie Hobbs to once again call for “common-sense guardrails” on the voucher program.
As we asked ChatGPT to give us its best guess as to who the identity of the end user for Project Blue might be, the AI dropped some it-could-be-worse news about the data center ecosystem.
Apparently, there are even more secretive companies out there than STACK Infrastructure.
Still, the idea that “NDAs are the ticket to compete” strikes us as a very pro-AI bias.
We ran our questions through several AI models, and came away with slightly different answers each time. But we challenged its answers, fact-checked its responses, tested its logic and feel pretty good that its final assessment is at least totally plausible.
Love the Spy vs Spy reference. Good work, TA crew. It’ll be interesting to see if you cracked the code on the end user, or if AI was hallucinating.
This recent development in the voucher program is a self-fulfilling prophecy of sorts. That extra few hundred million dollars will serve our BBB-induced state deficit well if/when lawmakers finally admit that a school voucher system needs a cap. I foresee school voucher reform being the bipartisan solultion to the deficit (with the Freedom Caucus digging in its heels and producing all sorts of political theater along the way).
Thank you for the continued reporting on Project Blue! Councilmember Lee is having a public meeting about Project Blue later this month (you may have already reported on it), and I’m interested to see what that brings.