Blackstone quietly builds Australian energy platform to supply its data centres

Blackstone is looking at developing its own renewable generation to supply data centres in Australia, according to sources quoted by NPM on Tuesday 27 October 2026. Those sources said the platform is being set up from scratch and has made a few small purchases of land and assets without publicity. Neither Blackstone nor AirTrunk would comment.

The Australian data centre exposure comes through AirTrunk, which Blackstone and the Canadian pension fund CPPIB bought in 2024 for A$24bn (US$16.7bn). NPM described the deal as the largest data centre acquisition anywhere at that time. AirTrunk now operates more than 755 MW across five assets in Melbourne and Sydney. It also runs or is developing facilities in Hong Kong, India, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore and Saudi Arabia.

Government policy is heading in a related direction. State and federal ministers agreed in August to develop national standards for large data centres under the planned AI laws, which Canberra intends to legislate in early 2027. The proposed rules would set minimum requirements on energy use, including self-supplied power, along with water consumption, land use, skills and workforce training.

AirTrunk has already linked some renewable supply to its operations by contract. The 25 MW Mulwala solar farm in the Riverina region of New South Wales was due to connect to the grid in June, after developer European Energy signed a PPA with Google and AirTrunk.

Globally, Blackstone has committed tens of billions of dollars to data centres. It paid US$10bn for QTS in 2021, and NPM data puts the business at 4.4 GW across 56 facilities in the US and Europe. On 7 October, AirTrunk founder and chief executive Robin Khuda told Nikkei the company plans to raise its total Japanese investment to between US$27bn and US$30bn over five years.