Data centres in T&T

14th July 2026

Just last week I wrote an article on the link between water and electricity in Barbados and the challenge of avoiding siloed planning. Little did I know that much of the non-football online conversation in Trinidad & Tobago over the following days would be dominated by the very issues of water and electricity, though in this case related to proposals for the construction of two largescale datacentres announced by the Trinidad & Tobago Prime Minister, Kamla Persad Bissessar on Friday 10th July.  

There was also an announcement about restarting the steel plant in Point Lisas and the production of vanadium, a strategically important metal. 

A lot of the online chat has concentrated on concerns over water availability and the ability of the electricity grid to supply the two proposed data centres. This discussion has been sparked because of the plethora of content from people opposing new data centres and their impact on the environment, noise pollution, water availability and the electricity grid, especially in the United States (where the majority of data centres are being built). 

While it is positive that the public is engaged and discussing these issues, I worry that Trinidad has developed something of a defeatist attitude when it comes to major projects; “we can’t manage to do that here” seems to be a common response. This does alarm me, because historically the country has a good track record in implementing major projects in the petrochemical and gas sectors and sometimes being first movers (for example with the construction of the Atlantic LNG facility). The issues of water and electricity should be problems that can be overcome with the right strategic planning and stakeholder engagement. 

Nevertheless, there is a fundamental issue that does deeply concern me about the proposed datacentres which I do not think is going to be easily overcome. 

In Trinidad any discussion about electricity needs to always be taken back one step further and placed in the context of the gas industry.  

Trinidad has long used competitively priced electricity as a draw for foreign investment. It features prominently on investment promotion websites and in presentations. The Global-T&T website has this to say:

The availability and abundant supply of affordable electricity and natural gas gives the sector a competitive advantage...

Given that we have just seen the shutdown of a world scale ammonia complex, operated by Nutrien, and the second of the two methanol plants operated by Methanex, because of an inability to negotiate gas supply contracts at affordable prices, this statement needs to be challenged. We do not have an abundant supply, unless we deliberately close down more of the industries currently using natural gas. 

Cheap electricity in Trinidad is a direct result of the fact that T&TEC purchases natural gas from the National Gas Company (NGC) at very attractive rates. While the exact price is not publicly available, if you look at the last published NGC financial report (2024) you can calculate that the rate is about USD 1.90 per mmbtu. And the reason you can calculate this is because T&TEC does not actually pay this amount to NGC, and it is recorded as a receivable in the notes to the accounts.  Essentially T&TEC does not pay for the gas it provides to the power generation companies who turn that gas into electricity. 

By contrast, all other customers purchasing gas from NGC are paying significantly higher rates (and I strongly suspect would not get away with not paying for the gas they receive). The light manufacturers, for example, have had their gas purchase price recently increased to USD 5.30 per mmbtu. While the gas sales price to the petrochemical sector is not publicly available, I calculate the number to be at least in the USD 6.00 mmbtu range and almost certainly significantly higher. 

Given the huge discount at which gas is sold to T&TEC and the ready availability of much higher paying customers crying out for supply (such as Methanex and Nutrien), Trinidad & Tobago needs to stop advertising itself as a location with cheap and abundant electricity.  This might have been the case decades ago when we were trying to develop markets for our gas, but it is certainly no longer the case today (and in fact has not been the case for more than a decade).  

A 300 MW and 150 MW data centre are going to collectively utilise more than ten thousand megawatt-hours of electricity every day.  This would represent an additional 40-45% increase above current electricity consumption, so new generation capacity will certainly be required. 

Many of the big new data centres being constructed in the United States are taking the approach of developing their own electricity generation capacity. Most of this is coming from natural gas. It is true that some plants are also incorporating solar and wind to generate some of the power, but because they need power 24/7 this has to be backed up by a firm source of electricity that can ramp up quickly when the sun does not shine or the wind does not blow.   Natural gas is the fuel most projects prefer.  

What sort of natural gas price would a data centre in Trinidad & Tobago need to be able to compete with the projects planned and under construction in the United States? 

Published sources indicate that plants in the US are able to secure gas contracts with prices in the USD 2.00 per mmbtu range (Henry Hub is currently USD 2.87). These very competitive gas prices are available at some specific locations in the US, for example in Texas, because there are large volumes of associated gas being produced along with shale oil with not enough pipeline infrastructure to get it to market. In some locations in Texas earlier this year natural gas prices were actually negative, given the high production and lack of demand. 

This price range is in the same ballpark as the current T&TEC natural gas purchase price, which is why to a project developer looking at Trinidad’s current electricity rates we would look like a possible good location. But from the perspective of NGC and the Trinidad taxpayer, would we want to sell gas at this significantly lower price, given the existence of customers willing and able to pay more than double? 

If we look at the whole picture from the gas wellhead to the gigabyte, I have serious doubts that datacentres make sense for Trinidad & Tobago, unless we suddenly find a massive new natural gas reservoir that can be cheaply produced and brought to market.