The Amazon GW Ranch emissions target of 33 million tons of CO2 per year would make a planned West Texas power plant the single largest source of climate pollution in the United States, according to The Verge. The company’s 2040 net-zero pledge is starting to look like a note written to a different version of itself.
What GW Ranch Actually Is
The project, known as GW Ranch, would occupy 8,400 acres along Highway 18, about 17 miles north of Fort Stockton in Pecos County, Texas, according to San Antonio Current. Amazon is the data centre tenant; the on-site gas plant is being developed by Pacifico Energy.
Pacifico’s plant would use 35 natural-gas turbines capable of generating up to 7.65 gigawatts of electricity, enough to serve more than 1.9 million homes at peak demand, per E&E News. At least initially, the plant is designed to operate off-grid, feeding electricity directly to the data centre rather than connecting to the Texas state grid.
The permit numbers are where it gets uncomfortable. Beyond the 33 million tons of greenhouse gases, GW Ranch’s air permits authorise more than 12,000 tons per year of regulated pollutants including soot, ammonia, carbon monoxide, and volatile organic compounds, with nitrogen oxides alone permitted at more than 2,800 tons annually, according to Texas Standard. To put the CO2 figure in proportion: 33 million tons is nearly 5% of Canada’s entire annual greenhouse gas output.
For comparison, a competing Pecos County gas project, Fermi America’s Project Matador, is permitted to release up to 24 million tons of greenhouse gases per year. That would also rank among America’s worst polluters. GW Ranch beats it by a third.
Amazon GW Ranch Emissions and the Permit Loophole Worth Knowing
There is a structural quirk buried in the permitting, flagged by San Antonio Current. Because Pacifico Energy’s gas plant is technically a separate entity from Amazon’s data centre campus, Amazon itself qualifies for minor air permits as a low-level polluter. The plant’s emissions sit in Pacifico’s name. Clean hands on paper; different picture on the ground.
Amazon spokesperson Margaret Callahan confirmed the data centre ‘will be powered by new on-site generation that won’t raise electricity costs for Texas families,’ and added that the company is ‘also exploring opportunities for solar energy and battery storage on site.’ Callahan also said the project ‘is designed to transition to grid-connected service as interconnection timelines allow,’ per E&E News. The phrase ‘as interconnection timelines allow’ is doing some heavy lifting there.
On the broader pledge tension, an Amazon spokesperson said, ‘The world looks different now than when we co-founded the climate pledge,’ while also claiming, ‘Our commitment hasn’t changed.’ Amazon officials also pointed to 10 gigawatts of carbon-free energy projects the company has enabled in Texas since 2010 as evidence of its net-zero commitment.
The Emissions Trend Is Already Moving the Wrong Way
GW Ranch is a bet on a trajectory that Amazon’s own figures confirm is already heading in the wrong direction. The company reported a 16% rise in carbon emissions last year. Its ESG Dive coverage of Amazon’s 2025 sustainability data shows carbon intensity (measured as grams of CO2 equivalent per dollar of revenue) climbed a further 3% in 2025, though it remains 38% below the 2019 baseline. Scope 3 emissions, the hardest to control, account for 76% of Amazon’s total footprint, per the Amazon 2025 Sustainability Report.
Amazon is not alone in this pivot. Microsoft has announced a 2GW data centre development in Pecos, Texas, backed by a 2.67GW gas plant of its own, according to Energy Digital. Amazon is also exploring a natural-gas-powered data centre outside Pittsburgh. The industry is converging on the same answer to the AI power problem, and it is not renewables.
The real test for Amazon’s 2040 pledge arrives when GW Ranch seeks its operating licence. If the plant runs at anything close to its permitted capacity, the gap between Amazon’s climate commitments and its infrastructure bets will be difficult to paper over with a sustainability report and a solar panel announcement.
