US data centers could consume more natural gas than Germany and Japan combined by 2035
- ID
- 24773
- Status
- summarized
- Published
- 16 Sep 2026, 2:29 AM
- Fetched
- 16 Sep 2026, 2:48 AM
- Provider
- TechCrunch
- Category
- technology
- Original URL
- https://techcrunch.com/2026/09/15/us-data-centers-could-consume-more-natural-gas-than-germany-and-japan-combined-by-2035/
- Source URL
- https://techcrunch.com/feed/
Summary
- Score
- 6.0
- Created
- 16 Sep 2026, 2:49 AM
- Tags
- Audience
- developersvibe_coderssaas_founders
What happened
BloombergNEF projects US data centers will consume ~18 billion cubic feet of natural gas per day by 2035, nearly double its forecast from just nine months ago, surpassing Germany and Japan combined. Onsite gas-powered data centers from Meta, Microsoft, Google, and Amazon alone could use 2.9-3.4 billion cubic feet/day by 2035—roughly equal to all data center gas consumption today. Noreva analysts warn the combined data center and LNG export boom could spike natural gas prices, potentially hitting utility ratepayers.
Why it matters
If US natural gas prices rise sharply due to data center demand, cloud providers will likely pass energy cost increases through to compute pricing—Malaysian founders and developers running workloads on US cloud regions should model higher cloud cost trajectories and consider whether APAC-region or local data center options (e.g., Johor's growing DC cluster) offer better long-term cost stability.
Discussion angle
How much of your cloud bill is ultimately an energy bill—and does the US gas-demand forecast change the calculus for choosing AWS/Azure/GCP regions or considering Malaysian data center providers?