Were xAI's turbines legal? Shelby County and EPA's records

UPDATE, October 15th: I wrote below that xAI’s application for the 15 permanent turbines is dated September 3rd, 2024. That’s the date printed in the draft of the county’s permit evaluation I linked. But the permit the county issued on July 2nd, 2025 says the application is dated January 3rd, 2025, and so does the county’s public version of the same evaluation. So the September date looks like a typo in the draft. That means the permit came about six months after the application, not almost a year, and the timing doesn’t line up with the 364 days the way I said it did.

So, who wants an update on all of the FOIA requests I have spent weeks going through? I’ve been trying to answer one question since July. Are the gas turbines that xAI has been using at Colossus legal?

The xAI files

Every essay in this series is pinned to a question on the board at rachelandthecity.com/the-xai-files.

This is what I found.

Shelby County asked the EPA a question about xAI’s turbines in 2024 – and the EPA asked the county one right back.

In my last essay on the EPA, I said the county asked the feds two years ago whether the turbines needed permits. I said the county is still waiting on the answer. That’s true, but it’s only half the story.

The EPA sent me the first batch of its own xAI file this month. It’s 6,555 pages long – and the other half of the story is in it. I just had to find it.

Let’s start at the top.

The whole fight over xAI’s turbines comes down to one question. Does a gas turbine on a trailer need an air permit? Since at least August of 2024, the county’s answer has been no – not until it sits in one spot for more than 364 days.

On August 16th, 2024, Dr. Michelle Taylor wrote to EPA’s regional air boss. She ran the county health dept. back then. She said the 364-day rule came from EPA’s own “Region 4 staff.”

Then she asked the EPA to put it in writing. She wanted a statement that the turbines don’t need a local operating permit until they’ve been sitting in one place for more than 364 days. Her letter says that statement “would be advantageous to all parties concerned.”

They knew how important it was to get an answer from a bigger agency that they could point to – obviously.

That same month, the Southern Environmental Law Center wrote to the county. Everybody calls them the SELC. They wrote on behalf of four local and state groups, and they said at least the four biggest turbines needed permits right then. They also sent along something that’s easy to miss.

It was an order the county wrote itself, back in December of 2021. The health dept. told a company called Planter’s Gin to “IMMEDIATELY CEASE ALL OPERATIONS.”

The reason was simple: the order said it was operating without an air permit. Planter’s Gin is on West Mallory Avenue in 38109. That’s the same zip code as xAI’s site on Paul R. Lowry Road.

The contact name on that order is Wasim Khokhar. He’s the same county air official who later answered the public’s comments on xAI’s permit.

So the county has a tool to shut things down. It had used it less than three years before, in the same part of town.

Now, to be fair, those two cases aren’t the same. Planter’s Gin had permits and let them run out. You might recall from my previous essay about this that the way xAI’s situation went was – xAI’s side said it had been told it didn’t need the permits.

The Greater Memphis Chamber called it “official guidance” and never said who gave it. However, the folks who wrote the permit requests for xAI were also part of a petition from a group called COMET – that’s a group of companies that build and rent out these gas turbines – asking the EPA to count those gas turbines as mobile. They wanted an exemption.

Because, as the law is currently written, portable gas turbines still need air permits.

So the people writing xAI’s permits for Colossus I had to know those gas turbines needed permits – they’re the same experts who later wrote the technical part of the petition asking the EPA to exempt them.

So that leaves the question: Did xAI tell the county they didn’t need permits for the turbines because they were exempt? And the county said – okay – and then they went to the EPA to get a final ruling?

Or did xAI attempt to get the permits and the county said – Nah, dawg – you good.

What we do know is that in August of 2024, the county told the Daily Memphian there were “no construction or operating applications” for the site at all.

Either way, it looks to me like someone at the SCHD wanted some cover – because even though xAI’s side said it had already been told it was fine, the county still reached out to the EPA. On August 30th, Dr. Taylor sent SELC’s letter to EPA. She asked EPA to give it “careful attention and a response.”

Now walk through that fall with me.

On November 1st, 2024, the EPA wrote back. But its letter didn’t give the county the statement it wanted. It said it would do a formal review instead – it calls that a Regulatory Interpretation. It said the answer would come in “a formal response letter.”

The EPA also said it needed more info on the machines at the xAI site.

Five days later, an EPA engineer named Jacob Carpenter emailed Khokhar. He asked for a list of every generator on the site. He wanted the type, the fuel, the make and model, the size, and the spec sheets. He said the EPA needed to “confirm exactly what generator units are operating at the facility.”

On November 12th, Khokhar wrote back – “We will work with the company to get this information for you.”

The next morning, he wrote again – “I will try to get this information.”

And that’s all I could find. There’s no email from the county sending it – not in any of the 6,555 pages I was sent. Now, the EPA says more of the file is still coming, so it could still turn up.

But right now, the record shows the county saying twice that it would work on getting the list. It doesn’t show the list ever getting there. And that was almost 2 years ago.

So the county was waiting on the EPA’s answer. And as far as its file shows, the EPA never got the list it said it needed.

Then the EPA started writing the answer anyway.

On January 28th, 2025, an EPA staffer was leaving notes on a file called “Response – Regulatory Interpretation xAI.” In February, a new version showed up with “OGC feedback and review” in the name. OGC is the EPA’s Office of General Counsel – basically, its lawyers. So, a staffer was still leaving notes on March 7th, 2025.

After that, the trail goes cold. There’s no final letter in the file so far. The file also has no email sent to the county. I can’t tell you what the draft said, cause the file only has the note alerts – not the draft itself.

Then, three months later, on June 2nd, 2025, the county answered SELC’s comments on xAI’s permit. Khokhar wrote that the EPA “is aware of and has not objected to” the county’s call on the turbines. The county’s call was that the temporary ones didn’t need permits.

That was true. The EPA hadn’t objected – but as far as its own file shows, it hadn’t answered either.

That same letter did one more thing – it put a date on it. It said the company “projects these units will be removed by the end of July 2025.” It also said something else. If the turbines stayed more than 12 months, they “could become stationary sources subject to air permitting.”

So the county put a clock on it in writing. On July 17th, 2025, xAI’s spokesperson said all the temporary turbines at the site had “already been decommissioned.” That’s the company’s word, not the county’s.

But I don’t buy it.

SELC’s satellite image from July 1st, 2025 showed 24 turbines on the site – the day before the county permitted 15 turbines. But this September, MLGW’s CEO told the city council he didn’t know how many temporary generators were still running. He said the rest of them would move off when the second 150 megawatts of power comes on.

Okay – so to be clear here – the permit the county gave xAI in July of 2025 wasn’t for the mobile gas turbines. It was for 15 permanent turbines – stationary ones, with pollution controls.

xAI’s application for them is dated September 3rd, 2024. But the health department didn’t get it until January 3rd, 2025. About six weeks later, the county said the application was complete. Then it waited until April to give public notice and hold a hearing. The county didn’t issue the permit until July 2nd, 2025.

From the date on that application to the day the permit came out, that’s almost a year. And what does that line up with perfectly? The 364 days the county said xAI could run its mobile turbines without a permit.

It makes me wonder: if both the health department and xAI knew a public comment period was coming, why not push it off as long as possible? The longer it waited, the more of the data center could get built before anybody could put up a roadblock that might actually stop it.

Anyway, I asked the county for its inspection and site-visit records from the day the permit came out – to see if any mobile turbines were still being used at Colossus I. The county gave me a drive last week (that’s the one that cost $100 – thanks to everyone who chipped in), but those records weren’t on it. Nothing on it said why. I’ve asked the county about that, and I’m still waiting.

Now back to what the EPA told SELC.

In July of 2025, SELC asked the EPA for any document tied to that review – “including but not limited to” any “Regulatory Interpretation” or “formal response letter.” EPA closed that request on August 13th, 2025. Its answer was “No records.”

But EPA’s own file shows the draft being worked on earlier that year – inside the dates SELC asked about. It went by three different file names, and one had “OGC feedback and review” in its name.

Maybe the EPA’s search just missed the working drafts. That could be it. It’s still a strange gap between two answers from the same agency.

About a year later, xAI’s lawyers pointed to that silence in court.

In the federal lawsuit over the Southaven turbines, in a filing from July of 2026, they quoted the county’s “has not objected” line.

They leaned on what they called “the EPA’s apparent acquiescence.” That’s a fancy way of saying the EPA seemed to go along with it. Then, in a footnote, they told the judge “no such Interpretation has issued.”

The EPA’s silence ended up as part of xAI’s defense.

So, line the dates up, and here’s what you get. The county asked EPA to sign off on a rule. EPA asked the county for a list, and the county said it would try. EPA started drafting an answer – one version was labeled for its lawyers’ review – and then the file goes quiet. The whole time, the county had a shutdown order it had used on a business running without its air permit.

Everybody had a piece of the job, and on the record, nobody finished theirs.

The EPA expects to finish sending its xAI file to me by March 1st, 2027. I have no idea why it would take that long. They did call me a couple of weeks before the first drop to tell me that they could go ahead and send me what they had – because someone else had already requested the files that they gave me. So, I basically got a copy of someone else’s request. So, that reads to me like – the rest of my request may be totally new info.

While I was on that call – I was also told that my requested files had to go through 3 layers of legal before they could be sent to me.

And yeah – I just thought what you thought too.

Every record this essay is built on is on its own page, and the ones that exist nowhere else online are hosted there: the records behind this essay.

If you like facts-first info on all this, consider leaving a tip on Venmo or PayPal – this stuff takes a lot of time to put together. And check out everything I’ve written with citations and receipts at the xAI Files.

Sources

Everything I have written about AI is in one place at rachelandthecity.com/the-ai-files.

The xAI files

Sources

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