The xAI Files · a reference page
Who oversees xAI in Memphis and Southaven?
There isn't one referee. There's a stack of them, in different buildings, in two states. Piece by piece, here's who has the job, from the public record. Where the record has no answer, the cell says so.
From the public record as of September 7th, 2026. Agency names link to the agency, or to the records I've posted from it.
1The land and the zoningWho decides what can be built where, and who sold the ground
Sells city land, passes zoning and ordinances. On March 18th, 2025 it voted to sell about 13 acres of the city's sewer-plant land to xAI's land company. The deed, dated May 14th, 2026, declares a value of $820,000. A council member said an appraisal was done. The City later produced one appraisal - prepared for xAI's land company, for that company's own use, valuing the land at $820,000. I've asked whether the City had one of its own. Planning and Development does site plan reviews. The Assessor keeps parcel records. Tax appeals go to the Board of Equalization.
City of Southaven and DeSoto County
Zoning and local approvals. Southaven's industrial zoning already allows "data storage" warehouses. It approved xAI's next building on September 1st, 2026.
Nobody. Land use is a local job.
2The buildingsPermits, plan review and inspections
Memphis Construction Code Enforcement
Building permits, plan review, and checking the declared cost of the job. The City Engineer issues right-of-way permits and wrote that no construction could start without one. The code has no definition for a data center, so the buildings were permitted as storage warehouses.
Design review of each building, approved by the Board of Aldermen.
Nobody.
3The air: the gas turbinesWho permits the power plants and hears appeals
Shelby County Health Department
Not the state. It runs the local air program and issues the construction permits. Appeals go to the Memphis and Shelby County Air Pollution Control Board, which dismissed the Colossus 1 appeal on December 15th, 2025.
The Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality. It treated the portable turbines as exempt, then agreed on July 30th, 2026 that all 69 come out by July 2027, with no penalty. Appeals go to the MDEQ Permit Board.
Covers both states. Writes the Clean Air Act rules and hands day-to-day permitting to the states and counties. In January 2026 it said a turbine on a trailer is still a stationary source.
4The air you breatheWho measures it
Shelby County Health Department
Runs the air monitors with EPA grant money. Its new South Memphis station has been reporting since August 16th, 2026. It refused a fine-particle monitor there in June 2026.
Not in the record yet.
Pays for the monitors and runs AirNow, the public feed they report to.
5The water going inWho sells it and who guards the aquifer
Memphis Light, Gas and Water, the city-owned utility, sells the water. Its wellhead-protection review is the aquifer check, and it's marked unassigned on every xAI record in the city's system, at the water plant and the battery yard alike.
MS Office of Land and Water Resources
Permits pumping groundwater (permit GW-15667).
Nobody, day to day.
6The water going outSewer, runoff and the recycling plant
TDEC Division of Water Resources
The Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation permits discharges, construction runoff and the water recycling plant. Five permits on this site. City Public Works runs the sewer, pretreatment, and the sale of treated wastewater to xAI.
Covers stormwater runoff from the site (coverage MSR109658).
The Clean Water Act, carried out through the states.
7The powerWho generates it, delivers it and can cut it back
TVA, the Tennessee Valley Authority, a federal corporation, generates the power and approved each block for xAI. A data center rate class starts October 2nd, 2026. MLGW delivers it and can order data centers to cut back. It has done so 15 times in 2026.
The site itself
The Southaven plant makes its own power with the turbines. Whether it sells power, and to whom, is not in the record.
The federal layer here, and the same one as in the Memphis column.
8The batteries and fireHundreds of Tesla Megapacks next to homes
Fire code, hazardous materials permits, pre-incident planning. The Tennessee State Fire Marshal writes the battery fire code and defers to Memphis. Shelby County Emergency Management keeps the disaster plan, which has no records on the batteries.
Unknown. Nobody in the record has said who reviews a battery installation in Mississippi.
Approves the county disaster plan.
9Taxes and moneyWho decides what the neighborhoods get back
Ordinance 5953 sends part of xAI's property tax to a public-use fund. The advisory board's recommendations were accepted June 23rd, 2026. County Commission resolutions are requests, not orders.
Not in the record yet.
Oversight letters and budgets only. It can't issue or deny a single permit on this page.
10Enforcement and the courtsWho can make anyone stop
Hears appeals of county air permits.
Hears appeals of state permits. An April 2026 appeal of the big turbine permit is pending, hearing date unknown.
Justice Department and the courts
DOJ enforces the Clean Air Act. Citizens can sue under it too, which is what the NAACP did in April 2026. DOJ moved in June 2026 to dismiss that case. The judge has said she intends to deny that.
If a data center is coming to your town, ask these
- Who issues air permits here, the state or a local program? In Shelby County it's the county health department.
- Who reviews the building plans, and does your code even define a data center?
- Who's your utility, who supplies its power, and who approves a new customer this big?
- Who reviews battery storage under the fire code, and is it in the county's disaster plan?
- Where does your state post permit notices? In Texas it's TCEQ, the state environmental agency.
- Who sold the land, and is there an appraisal?
What changed on this page, and when
October 13th, 2026: updated the Memphis City Council cell - the City produced an appraisal on October 12th.
September 7th, 2026: first version. Built from permits, agency letters, council minutes, court filings and the agencies' own answers to records requests. "Not in the record yet" means no document has said. Nothing here says why anyone did what they did.
Part of The xAI Files. Questions this page belongs to: who is in charge of what they built, and who oversees it?