South Korea Picks Texas Gas Plant To Power AI Data Centers As First Project In $350,000,000,000 Investment Deal

South Korea has picked a Texas natural gas plant for artificial intelligence data centers as the first project under its $350 billion U.S. investment pledge.

The 6.3-gigawatt plant planned for Encinal, Texas, would serve AI data centers and semiconductor factories and is worth more than $20 billion, Reuters reported.

South Korean Industry Minister Kim Jung-kwan told Reuters after briefing lawmakers Tuesday that a U.S. government investment committee must still sign off on the plans and that South Korea needs further talks with Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick. President Donald Trump would announce the final plan, Reuters reported, citing the Yonhap news agency.

Trump had warned of higher tariffs after U.S. officials complained that South Korea was investing too slowly compared with partners such as Japan, according to the outlet. The $350 billion South Korean investment pledge is part of a November 2025 trade deal that set a 15% U.S. tariff on imports from the East Asian nation.

Stuart Turley, president and CEO of Sandstone Group, told the Daily Caller News Foundation the plant would give South Texas producers an outlet for gas from new wells. The amount of gas burned off at Eagle Ford wells or left without a route to market fell after 2024 as new pipelines were built, and the area is seeing new drilling and investment.

“This plant and investment from South Korea is a huge win for the US, Texas, and the local producers able to make money on the natural gas,” he said, adding that producers he works with in the Eagle Ford are “thrilled” because the plant would take gas from new wells that might otherwise be burned off.

“This kind of project is exactly why I tell people (counterintuitively) that data centers will bring electricity prices down, not raise them,” Christopher Johnson, president of the American Energy Leadership Institute, told the DCNF. “They are large, predictable demand loads that justify this kind of capital expenditure.”

“With this new power, we not only can power data centers, but the heavy industry we need to reshore manufacturing to the U.S.,” he added.

“The same reasons why it’s easy to build data centers in Texas are also why we can build immense amounts of power,” he noted.