Data Center Valley (Ekibastuz)

Data Center Valley is the project that changes Kazakhstan's position in the regional market. The government launched it in January 2026 on land next to the Ekibastuz GRES-1 coal power complex in Pavlodar region, with 200 hectares allocated initially out of a reserve exceeding 1,300 hectares, 300 MW of transmission capacity available and a stated design ceiling of 1 GW. Kazakhtelecom is the project operator through its wholly owned subsidiary KT-Telecom, which signed a binding term sheet with US infrastructure developer Firebird; the package of agreements signed with Firebird and NVIDIA is valued by the government at $10bn and covers roughly 100,000 GPUs, including NVIDIA GB300 and Vera Rubin parts. Kazakhtelecom's chairman said in August 2026 that the immediate priority is completing a first 50 MW facility in June 2027, with the campus expanded in step with confirmed demand; earlier government statements referred to 125 MW increments in 2027 and 2028, so the phasing is still moving. The government targets Tier III standard and PUE of 1.25, and expects at least $3bn a year in export revenue. The proposition for buyers is blunt: coal-fired power at some of the lowest tariffs in the region, converted into export-priced AI compute.