A Startup Wants to Power Data Centers With ‘Supercritical’ Carbon Dioxide

American Supercritical is developing supercritical CO2 retrofit units that can make the simple-cycle gas turbines powering many data centers significantly more efficient, potentially increasing output by up to 50% while reducing water use and avoiding additional emissions from the retrofit itself. For CIOs and technology leaders, the strategic takeaway is that power is now a first-order constraint on AI and data center growth, so energy architecture is becoming a competitive differentiator—but the technology is still early, with cost, supply-chain, and commercialization risks that mean it should be evaluated as an emerging option, not a guaranteed near-term solution.