AI giant Anthropic has signed an agreement to operate in a proposed $32 billion mega AI centre on Queensland’s Western Downs, marking the company’s first major infrastructure investment in Australia.
Work on the 725-hectare site near Dalby is expected to begin before Christmas and employ 1500 in construction and eventually 1400 in the operational side of the business.
Dalby has a current population of about 12,800 and the project will provide a massive economic boost to the region with the influx of workers and contractors during construction and the permanent workforce.
Anthropic is at the forefront of the global AI revolution, which Elon Musk says will eventually make money irrelevant, supposedly because AI robots will produce more food, housing, transport, and energy than humans can consume, and goods will be super abundant.
Anthropic has experienced unprecedented growth from annual revenue of $500 million in late 2025 to more than $65 billion currently, fueled by massive enterprise adoption of its Claude AI models that will run out of the facility.
The Federal MP for Maranoa David Littleproud sees the project as a massive boost for the Western Downs economy and is confident that the massive amounts of water and electricity required for the site will be available, including from gas resources near Dalby and solar farms.
The facility will require the equivalent of the output of the Eraring Power Station, comparable to the energy use of roughly 1.5 million average Australian households.
It will be called the Western Downs Digital Park and aims to come online by 2027, with the broader build-out expected to take four to six years.
Unlike the unrealistic Federal Government proposals that aim to restrict new data centres strictly to 100% renewables, the Queensland state government will let the facility draw from a diverse local energy mix, including existing gas-fired power and the Kogan coal-fired power station.
Littleproud says Anthropic is expected to cover full grid-connection costs and go to market for long-term power agreements. Anthropic’s lease agreement at the site remains subject to final approval from the Foreign Investment Review Board (FIRB) and local council planning sign-offs.
Anthropic is heavily backed by tech giants. Amazon has committed to investing up to $33 billion, while Alphabet (Google) maintains a massive multi-billion-dollar stake and tech infrastructure partnership.
Premier David Crisafulli said the project was a direct result of his recent trade mission to the US. “This is a major win that will deliver more jobs, put more energy into Queensland’s grid and drive down power prices for Queenslanders,” he said.
“My meeting with Anthropic during the trade mission was to outline why Queensland was the place to invest, with energy security, locations to invest and a streamlined approvals process to get it right.”
Mr Crisafulli has promised data centre investment will drive down energy costs for consumers, and companies must add energy to the local grid.
The $32 billion complex is actually an infrastructure partnership where Anthropic is the primary anchor tenant.
While the physical facility is being built by Singapore-based developer Zerra DC, Anthropic’s massive capital backing and global user base for Claude are what make anchoring a multi-gigawatt mega-project financially viable.
