Kazakhstan to Build Central Asia's Largest 1 GW Data Center Campus
Kazakhstan launches Central Asia's largest 1 GW data center campus in Ekibastuz, poised to be a regional AI/cloud hub.
Kazakhstan is set to build Central Asia's largest 1 GW data center campus, a landmark project known as Data Center Valley. Located on 1,400 hectares near the coal-mining city of Ekibastuz, the campus leverages affordable energy and vast space to support high-density AI and cloud services. This initiative, officially launched in January 2026, is poised to create thousands of jobs, attract global tech talent, and establish Kazakhstan as a premier digital hub for the region. Construction is underway, with AI-specific halls and plots for hyperscalers in development, aiming to double the nation's IT market.
What is Kazakhstan's Data Center Valley project in Ekibastuz and why is it significant?
The Data Center Valley in Ekibastuz is Kazakhstan's strategic initiative to build Central Asia's largest data center campus, targeting 1 GW of capacity by 2029. Its significance lies in its unique combination of low-cost power, improved network latency, vast land availability, and attractive investor incentives, positioning it as a pivotal regional hub for AI and cloud infrastructure.
Why Ekibastuz?
Kazakhstan's Data Center Valley is a massive 1 GW project near Ekibastuz designed to become Central Asia's premier digital hub. Its significance stems from leveraging low-cost power and strategic location to attract hyperscale investment, meet regional AI and cloud demand, and ensure national data sovereignty.
- Power: The site is located within 10 km of three 4 GW coal plants and a 500 kV transmission loop, enabling electricity prices 30-40% lower than European hubs.
- Latency: A new Trans-Caspian fiber optic route reduces round-trip latency from Frankfurt to Almaty to just 57 ms, comparable to latency from Frankfurt to Warsaw or Vienna.
- Land: The project is situated on 1,400 hectares of flat, seismically stable land owned by a state developer, which eliminates zoning risks for investors.
Scale & Specs
| Metric | 2026 Milestone | 2029 Full Build-out |
|---|---|---|
| IT Load | 200 MW (Phase 1) | 1,000 MW |
| Racks | ≈8,000 | ≈40,000 |
| PUE Target | 1.25 (Tier III) | 1.15 (Tier III+) |
| Jobs | 500 high-skill | 2,500 direct / 7,500 indirect |
| Investment | $6 billion | $30 billion |
"We are not building warehouses for servers; we are building AI factories," Prime Minister Olzhas Bektenov told ministers on 25 February 2026, repeating the presidential instruction that every megawatt must be "AI-ready" from day one.
Demand Drivers
- Domestic AI Cloud: High demand from within Kazakhstan, where the national supercomputer (2 exa-flops, Nvidia H200) operates at 85% utilization, forces public agencies and universities to seek external GPU capacity.
- Regional Shortage: The entire Central Asian region currently has only 62 MW of Tier III capacity - less than a single large data center in Singapore - creating a significant market opportunity for hyperscale providers.
- Data Sovereignty Laws: National regulations mandate that the personal data of Kazakh citizens be stored within the country, compelling global SaaS providers to establish a local presence.
Competitive Field
While competing projects exist, such as Uzbekistan's planned 300 MW facility and Astana's 100 MW Tier IV data center, none offer the 1 GW single-campus scale of Data Center Valley. The project's competitive edge is sharpened by a robust incentive package, including a 10-year corporate tax exemption, VAT-free IT equipment imports, and diverse fiber connectivity to Europe, Russia, and China.
Projections from analysts at the Data Center & AI Infrastructure Central Asia 2026 conference indicate that if the project remains on schedule, Kazakhstan's share of regional colocation revenue could surge from 38% in 2025 to 60% by 2028.
Energy & Sustainability Balance
Initially powered by coal-fired baseload energy, the project includes a mandatory transition to renewables. The development contract requires the integration of 400 MW of wind and 200 MW of solar-plus-battery storage by 2030. A planned 20 MW green hydrogen pilot will provide fuel-cell backup, supporting the campus's goal of achieving carbon neutrality by 2032 to attract environmentally conscious tenants.
Market Ripple Effects
The project is already stimulating the local economy, with system integrators securing contracts for services like GPU-as-a-Service, sovereign cloud, and disaster recovery. The Ministry of Digital Development projects that the first 200 MW phase will boost the national IT services market, currently valued at $1.1 billion, by an additional $450 million in annual revenue.
The influx of foreign specialists is evident, with a surge in engineers from France, Turkey, and Korea. This has led to high occupancy rates in Almaty hotels during site-selection periods and a 25% increase in local warehouse rental prices near Ekibastuz, as subcontractors secure space for construction materials.
Construction Timeline
- Q3 2026: Completion of the 100 MW shell, with the first 2,000 racks ready for customer fit-out.
- Q1 2027: The 50 MW AI wing becomes operational, with a pilot customer deploying a 10,000-GPU cluster.
- Q4 2027: Connection to the new 300 MW Kurchatov nuclear power plant is established.
- 2028-2029: Build-out of the remaining 750 MW across four separate quadrants, each with independent infrastructure.
Risk Watch-List
- Power deficit: With domestic power consumption projected to increase by 6% annually, the government faces the challenge of balancing energy allocation between industrial users and the new data centers.
- Water scarcity: The campus's cooling systems could consume up to 12 million m³ of water annually, prompting the exploration of two-phase immersion cooling to reduce water usage by up to 70%.
- Skills gap: The existing pool of only 3,000 certified data-center technicians nationwide presents a skills gap. To address this, local universities are launching 18-month, developer-funded apprenticeship programs.
If successfully executed, the Ekibastuz campus will provide more digital capacity than all of Central Asia combined, positioning Kazakhstan to become the undisputed AI and cloud gateway for the region by the end of the decade.