Piyush Goyal, India’s Minister of Commerce and Industry, made the case for India as a global data centre hub at a meeting with the Indian-American community in Chicago. His message was straightforward: the national power grid, with 520 gigawatts integrated into a single infrastructure, is now the second largest in the world after China’s, and 60% of its installed capacity already comes from clean sources — solar, wind, hydroelectric, and nuclear.
By 2033, when the grid is expected to reach 1,000 gigawatts, that share will climb to 70%. Goyal argued that India can deliver clean or renewable energy around the clock at the lowest prices available on the global market. Companies can currently secure an 80% guaranteed supply of clean energy at 7–8 cents per kilowatt-hour. A fully clean supply comes in at around 11–12 cents. Figures that are hard to match on the international stage.
This announcement is part of a transformation that began more than a decade ago. India previously operated several regional grids, with chronic imbalances between electricity surpluses and deficits depending on the area. Integrating these into a single national grid has strengthened system reliability and enabled the large-scale expansion of renewables. Within this framework, nuclear power plays a structural role — not as an alternative to renewables, but as a stable component of an energy mix that must ensure continuity of supply. That continuity is a non-negotiable requirement for data centres, which depend on multi-layered electrical redundancy.
Further reinforcing the nuclear outlook is the SHANTI Bill, currently under consideration in the Indian Parliament. The proposed legislation aims to mobilise private capital in the nuclear energy sector, opening the door to private companies and public-private partnership models. It is a long-awaited development: until now, Indian nuclear power has been an exclusive state domain, and opening it to private investment could significantly accelerate installed capacity. Goyal also noted that data centre infrastructure construction costs in India are one-quarter to one-fifth of what they would be in the United States or Europe — an advantage that compounds the energy one.
The Chicago visit was part of a broader series of meetings with American investors, following Goyal’s participation in the G20 Trade Ministers’ Meeting in Milwaukee. His audience included Indian-American entrepreneurs and major US technology companies, to whom India is presenting itself as a reliable alternative in the current geopolitical climate. If the SHANTI Bill is passed and private investment in nuclear power takes off, India could build a clean, uninterrupted energy base over the coming years that few other countries could replicate — at precisely the moment when global demand for power to run artificial intelligence and data centres shows no sign of slowing.
