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A data center’s construction benchmark is not the same as the cost of delivering an operational facility. Depending on its scope, a quoted figure may exclude land, utility work, site conditions, professional fees and the servers and other active IT equipment the building is meant to house. Power access, cooling resources and permitting can add further cost or delay, but the available benchmarks do not support one universal all-in price.
What does a data center construction estimate include?
Start by asking what the estimate measures. Turner & Townsend’s 2025 data centre construction cost index is a construction benchmark, not a complete development budget. Its methodology draws on cost data from more than 300 live or recent projects across more than 20 countries. It excludes land purchase, utility works, abnormal groundworks and site works, active IT equipment, and professional services fees.
That boundary matters because a building can be physically complete without being ready to run workloads. A usable project also needs such things as a viable power connection, commissioned electrical and cooling systems, and installed IT equipment. Which costs sit with the developer, utility, tenant or another party depends on the project; the index does not settle that allocation.
Construction costs and excluded project costs
- Measured construction scope: the index breaks facility construction into core and shell or architecture, mechanical and electrical systems, and contractor preliminaries and fees.
- Excluded from the index: land, utility works, abnormal groundworks and site works, active IT equipment, and professional services fees.
- Other project-specific budget items: taxes, financing and utility agreements can also affect an overall development budget. The cited sources do not quantify them for a particular site.
In particular, “electrical equipment” in the construction allocation should not be mistaken for the active IT equipment excluded by the methodology. Electrical infrastructure serves the facility; active IT equipment includes the computing hardware installed to perform its workloads.
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How much do electrical and mechanical systems account for?
In Turner & Townsend’s 2025 index, electrical and mechanical work make up most of the cited U.S. construction allocation. The shares below describe the index’s construction cost categories, not percentages of an all-in project budget or a quote for a specific data center.
| Construction category | Air-cooled facility | Liquid-cooled facility |
|---|---|---|
| Electrical, including equipment | 54% | 48% |
| Mechanical, including equipment | 22% | 33% |
| Core/shell and architecture | 14% | 9% |
| Contractor preliminaries and fees | 10% | 10% |
The comparison shows a larger mechanical share and a smaller electrical share for the liquid-cooled category in this index. It does not establish that liquid cooling is always more expensive or cheaper overall: rack density, system design, site conditions, water resources and the estimate’s scope all matter.
Are construction costs rising?
Turner & Townsend’s 2025 index reports a 5.5% increase in cost per watt for a traditional cloud-based, air-cooled data center in the United States. That is a benchmark movement for the stated facility type and geography—not a forecast, a dollar-per-watt construction quote, or a 5.5% increase in every data center’s total project cost.
The index’s international cost data were converted to U.S. dollars using average foreign exchange rates between October 1, 2024, and October 1, 2025. A per-watt measure cannot be turned into a dependable project budget without a defined capacity, location, design, pricing date and scope. Even multiplying a per-watt figure by capacity would not add the items the benchmark excludes.
Why can power access change the budget and schedule?
A site needs enough dependable power, and the route to that power can involve more than work within the data center. Transmission capacity, grid connections and utility infrastructure may need upgrades or expansion. The U.S. Department of Energy’s September 30, 2024, Transmission Impact Assessment describes transmission as fundamental to connecting new generation and loads, and notes that incremental transmission deployment has struggled to keep pace, contributing to delays and higher costs.
CBRE’s U.S. Real Estate Market Outlook 2025 also describes data center construction being extended while power infrastructure is upgraded or increased. That is a market observation, not a universal schedule or a project-level cost estimate. The sources do not establish a standard connection charge or say which party will pay it in every deal.
Separate the project’s clocks
- Permitting: approvals depend on the project and location; do not assume the facility construction period includes all permitting time.
- Facility construction: building and fitting out the site is only one part of delivery.
- Grid connection: power infrastructure work can continue beyond the building work and affect when the site can operate.
The International Energy Agency’s chart, “Average observed lead time for permitting, construction and grid connection for selected energy projects,” updated May 21, 2025, compares selected energy-project lead times. It is useful context for treating permitting, construction and connection as distinct stages, but it is not a data-center-specific schedule estimate.
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Cooling is both a design question and a local-resource question. The relevant conditions include the chosen cooling approach, available water, wastewater capacity, energy reliability and permitting timelines. The U.S. Geological Survey’s 2026 science synthesis on colocating AI data centers with energy infrastructure on federal public lands identifies these as considerations for decision-making; it does not establish a single cooling cost or water requirement applicable to every facility.
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Keep direct and indirect water impacts distinct. Direct water use is associated with the facility’s cooling systems. Indirect water use can occur in generating the electricity consumed by the site. Their scale depends on the cooling design, local conditions and power supply, so a national figure would not by itself establish the impact of a particular project.
Air-cooled and liquid-cooled designs should therefore be compared on the actual project’s electrical and mechanical requirements, rack density, water and wastewater conditions, and estimate boundary—not on the construction-share table alone.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.How should you evaluate a claimed total cost?
Before comparing two prices or using a benchmark to estimate a build, check that they cover the same facility, location, date and scope. A low construction number may omit major costs needed to develop and operate the site; a per-watt index is not an all-in project price.
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- Geography and date: Where will the facility be built, and when were the costs priced?
- Included work: Does the figure cover shell, mechanical and electrical fit-out, site work and abnormal ground conditions?
- Power delivery: Are utility works, transmission or connection upgrades included, and who is responsible for them?
- Operational equipment: Are active IT systems included, or is the estimate only for the facility?
- Other development costs: How are land, professional services, taxes, financing and utility agreements treated?
- Schedule: Are permitting, facility construction and grid connection shown separately?
Without a defined site and design, an all-in cost remains unresolved. The useful conclusion from a published benchmark is what its scope and categories tell you—not a universal price for building a data center.
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