786 Inna Allāha wa-malā'ikatahu yuṣallūna 'alā an-nabī, yā-ayyuhā al-ladhīna āmanū ṣallū 'alayhi wa-sallimū taslīmā
Joined March 2021
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Ephesus Research retweeted
We've been covering $NUAI for months now. The thesis hasn't changed.
Land: owned.
Construction permits: in hand.
Phase 1 power: contracted for 20 years.
Community: engaged.
The last piece of the puzzle is a tenant. Phase 1 doesn't need the air permit, so it can be leased on its own while Phase 2 waits. We think that's the path, and we'll let the company tell us when.
Ephesus Research retweeted
Scorecard for $NUAI's TCDC:
Seat at the table: STRONG ALIGNMENT
Lowering costs for Texans: STRONG ALIGNMENT
Water and power for Texans first: DESIGN ALIGNED
Full transparency (no NDAs): OPEN
Data centers pay for themselves: OPEN
American union jobs: OPEN
Not perfect. Now run the same six tests on a typical grid-queued Texas campus with a municipal water deal and a county abatement, and count how many it passes.
Ephesus Research retweeted
Now the timing.
Phase 1 looks good to go. No generation on site means no air permit and no ERCOT interconnection needed. Power is contracted for 20 years, county construction permits are in hand, and the preliminary plat cleared Odessa's planning commission 4-0 in September.
Phase 2 is on standby. Its standard air permit was filed in August, and Abbott's Sept 21 order paused TCEQ data center permits.
But look at what Phase 2 is: islanded, behind the meter, no draw on the grid, reclaimed water. If Texas restarts permitting with Hinojosa's list as the filter, TCDC's air permit should be well placed.
Ephesus Research retweeted
One more thing. $NUAI was on record before the election.
August 11, 2026: the company publicly backed Texas's push for tighter data center oversight. CEO Charlie Nelson (@Carboncharlie) said the company "welcomes clearer and higher standards" and that "Texans must come first."
Same release: pay its own way, protect the grid and local water, ongoing support for Odessa library programs and an after-school childcare program.
That wasn't written after the election. It was written three months before.
Ephesus Research retweeted
6/6 Requiring American union jobs: OPEN.
Nothing public yet on labor agreements, and no EPC contract announced.
What exists: $NUAI commitments on local hiring, local procurement and workforce training, in a county whose economy already runs on licensed industrial trades.
If the legislature makes union labor law, it's a cost line, not a dealbreaker. But it's unproven, so we're scoring it that way.
Ephesus Research retweeted
5/6 Making data centers pay for themselves: OPEN.
We went through every deck, the 10-Q, both earnings calls and the city and county agendas. We found no Chapter 312 abatement for TCDC.
The land was bought, not gifted: the second Grow Odessa parcel at $25,000 an acre. In March, TCDC paid Grow Odessa $4.35M to replace the old deed conditions with one: start Phase 1 construction within 2 years or Grow Odessa can buy the land back.
The open item: water and wastewater come through an Industrial District, where TCDC pays the city a fee in lieu of taxes instead of being annexed. Odessa's code allows that fee to be abated. Until the terms are public, this stays open.
The statewide sales tax exemption on data center equipment is Austin's call, not NUAI's. If it goes, it hits every Texas data center the same way.
Ephesus Research retweeted
4/6 Creating full transparency (no NDAs): OPEN.
Being public helps. The PPA was filed with the SEC: counterparty, megawatts, term, and Vistra's 5% non-voting interest in the portion of the project it powers. The power source is named. The water strategy is published.
What isn't public: the tenant. Pre-lease deals almost always run under NDA, and the PPA carries customary confidentiality terms.
Tenants usually get named once the lease is signed anyway, as Riot's was.
Ephesus Research retweeted
3/6 Putting water and power for Texans first: DESIGN ALIGNED.
Closed-loop liquid cooling and reclaimed water. Management says it is evaluating independent water and wastewater solutions that keep oilfield produced water in productive use, with the stated goal of minimizing draw on municipal drinking water.
In the Permian, produced water is the one water source nobody is short of.
Open item: municipal water and wastewater access runs through an Industrial District with the City of Odessa. Until a water agreement is public, this is a design commitment, not a contract.
Ephesus Research retweeted
2/6 Lowering costs for Texans: STRONG ALIGNMENT.
Phase 1: 20-year, 207 MW PPA with Luminant (Vistra), sourced from the 1,180 MW Odessa plant right next to the site. The COO said on the Q2 call that Phase 1 needs no ERCOT interconnection and no air permit, because there's no generation on site.
$NUAI pays for the Phase 1 substation itself. Under the PPA filing, NUAI buys the substation and related equipment through a Phase 1 purchase agreement, so that capacity cost doesn't land on households.
Phase 2: ~550 MW of on-site generation, islanded, behind the meter.
No new transmission for ratepayers to fund. The project pays for its own plumbing.
Ephesus Research retweeted
1/6 Giving Texans a seat at the table: STRONG ALIGNMENT.
TCDC didn't parachute into Odessa. It bought its land from Grow Odessa, the city's own economic development corporation, and every step since has gone through a public body: county construction permits, a preliminary plat approved 4-0 by Odessa's planning commission, and an Industrial District the city votes on in public.
And the commitments to the community started before a single server is running:
- Ongoing support for Odessa library programs
- Funding after-school childcare for working families
- Local procurement first, jobs and training through construction and operations
- 22 abandoned pipelines across 12 rights-of-way removed from an old oilfield site
- Senior team meeting regularly with the Mayor, the County Judge, the Rotary Club and local businesses
This is where having Will Gray as President of the Permian comes into play for $NUAI. The former CEO's job now is the local relationships in the basin he grew up in.
Ephesus Research retweeted
$NUAI LOTS of noise this week around Texas governor-elect Gina Hinojosa and what she means for data centers.
@level39 laid out why her direct power over TCEQ, PUCT and ERCOT is more limited than the headlines suggest. Worth the read on his page.
So let's flip the question. Not what she can block, but how $NUAI stacks up against what she's actually asking for.
We scored TCDC against her six "Texans First" priorities using filings, decks and management's own words.
2 strong alignments. 1 aligned by design. 3 still open.
Close enough that TCDC could become the model for how data centers get built in Texas.
Thread below with @fnitefiend and @optionology.
More power for $NUAI could also mean more value for $VST.
My latest Ephesus Research article examines the opportunity from Vistra and Luminant’s side of the contract.
Vistra owns the 1,180 MW natural gas plant in Odessa, Texas. Its affiliate, Luminant, is the seller under TCDC’s 20-year power agreement for up to 207 MW.
That disclosed maximum represents approximately 17.5% of the plant’s rated capacity. Subtracting it leaves 973 MW, although that remainder is not confirmed to be available or uncommitted.
The commercial question is straightforward: how much more could Vistra earn by allocating additional power to TCDC?
Actual PPA pricing has not been publicly established, so the following is an illustration. All dollar figures are USD, and the larger allocations are hypothetical.
Assume:
• TCDC electricity sales at $60/MWh.
• Equivalent alternative sales at $45/MWh.
• 90% utilization.
Holding total modeled generation and ordinary generation costs constant, the additional annual contribution versus the 207 MW reference would be:
• 400 MW total TCDC allocation: +$22.8 million.
• 600 MW total TCDC allocation: +$46.5 million.
• 800 MW total TCDC allocation: +$70.1 million.
These figures describe a full operating year after delivery and ramp, before additional supply costs and capital recovery.
The 600 MW case shows the economics particularly clearly.
An additional 393 MW allocated to TCDC would generate approximately $185.9 million in additional TCDC sales. It would also displace approximately $139.4 million of alternative sales.
That leaves $46.5 million of incremental annual contribution under the assumed pricing. It is not a forecast of actual PPA profit.
From Vistra’s perspective, the attraction would be a larger customer commitment that improves the return on an asset it already owns.
The negotiation matters enormously. In that 600 MW case, every $1/MWh change in the retained premium changes annual contribution by approximately $3.1 million.
Higher alternative sales value or additional supply, delivery and credit costs could reduce or eliminate the assumed premium. Existing hedges, retail obligations and operating limits also affect how much power Luminant could commit.
The potential benefit runs both ways: NUAI secures more power for TCDC, while Vistra earns an adequate additional return for supplying it.
That is the economic case worth examining as the relationship develops.
Full analysis, charts and downloadable calculations:
"ephesusresearch.com/research…" (ephesusresearch.com/research…)
#DataCenters
Ephesus Research retweeted
Welcome to $NUAI @mikealfred 🫡
Ephesus Research retweeted
Lets talk in two weeks. Please show me your comment where you bear thesis was Iran War or a democratic win.
Demand still holds, market about to go on a rally my friend. Better close your shorts.
Ephesus Research retweeted
Name me another company outside of $NUAI that has firm, contracted powered land for 200+ MW that can be brought online next year
Management has also mentioned various times they are fully funded for phase 1
I can not stress enough how $NUAI is an absolute zero now. No chance they land hyperscalers partner on TX.
They don’t have much cash either, they were hoping to issue equity at a much higher price.
Ephesus Research retweeted
Welcome to the $NUAI cap stack @mikealfred!
Ephesus Research retweeted
The governor-elect of Texas, Gina Hinojosa, has explicitly said that all currently permitted datacenters in Texas will be allowed to finish construction. This essentially covers all of the 2027 and likely well into 2028.
She is going to pass laws that ensure that all *newly* permitted datacenters going forward for delivery in 2028/2029 will pay taxes, commit to no increase in power prices for consumers, don’t impact water availability for people, be constructed with union labor and give “Texans a seat at the table.”
Sounds reasonable. She doesn’t want to lose a lot of good blue collar jobs and property taxes for small towns in rural Texas.
Datacenter commentary starts at 6:30 in this interview.
Also attaching her official campaign position from her website in the next post.
Sidenote: After watching a bunch of her speeches and interviews, I do think she is a political talent and probably has a future in national politics.
youtu.be/D-T6H3b8ZeE?is=mEWu…
$NUAI
Im not budging, gonna have to take my shares from my cold dead hands.
Energy will fall into crisis with dems halting infra buildout nation wide.
We're one of few ai hpc companies that has power gen access that bypassess permit requirements.
Share price is just the value someone is willing to pay and part ways with. But the value is always subject to rapid change.
Buy the dip.