Century Aluminum Hawesville Smelter (Justified Data Campus)
Large load · 1627 STATE ROUTE 3543, Hawesville, KY
The Hawesville site on the Ohio River in Hancock County, Kentucky, ran as Century Aluminum's 244,000 tonne-per-year smelter from 1969 until the company shut it in 2022 over power costs. Century sold the site to TeraWulf in February 2026 and TeraWulf is building a multiphase AI data center campus, the Justified Data Campus, on the same energized substation and 161-kV transmission connection. On Aug. 21, 2026 the Kentucky Public Service Commission approved a 482 MW electric-service agreement under which Big Rivers Electric and Kenergy will serve the campus, and Anthropic has leased about 401 MW of critical IT capacity for 20 years.
Overview
- Contracted demand
- 482 MW
- under construction
For years Big Rivers Electric, the Henderson, Kentucky generation and transmission co-op, supplied about 550 MW to the smelter, which used about 345 million kWh a month and cost Century roughly $17 million a month in power. Century told Big Rivers it would end the power purchase agreement on Aug. 20, 2013 and warned regulators the smelter would close and probably never reopen without a market-based replacement. Big Rivers applied to the commission to let Century bypass the co-op and buy electricity directly from the market.
Profile
- Curtailment, restart and 2022 shutdown
- Century restarted all three previously curtailed potlines in 2018, bringing 150,000 tonnes of production back online for about $115 million. In June 2022 it announced it would shut the smelter for 9 to 12 months starting in August because of rising energy costs, idling about 628 workers. The plant never restarted, and local officials said talks about restarting it ended without an agreement before the site was sold.
- Sale to TeraWulf and the Anthropic lease
- Century sold the site in February 2026 for $200 million in cash and kept a 6.8% non-dilutive interest in the completed data center. TeraWulf signed Anthropic as tenant on a 20-year lease worth about $19 billion in total lease revenue. The lease covers about 401 MW of critical IT capacity, up from the 370 MW TeraWulf presented to regulators in June, with delivery expected from late 2027 and the full amount in early 2028.
Facility
- Activity
- Former primary aluminum smelter (1969 to 2022) being converted into a multiphase AI and high-performance computing data center campus
- Industry
- Manufacturing
- Site type
- Facility
- Operating status
- Under construction
Related records
Timeline
- Aug 20, 2013
- Big Rivers power purchase agreement supplying about 550 MW to the smelter scheduled to end
www.alcircle.com
- Mar 12, 2018
- Century confirms restart of all three curtailed potlines
Century makes restart of Hawesville aluminium smelter official - Fastmarkets
- Aug 1, 2022
- Century begins temporary shutdown of the smelter over energy costs
Kentucky aluminum plant idling, laying off 600 workers | Kentucky | richmondregister.com
- Feb 2, 2026