The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) on Sept. 8, 2025, released a Request for Applications (RFA) for long-term lease agreements to use federal land at Idaho National Laboratory (INL) to establish and operate artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure integrated with innovative energy generation and storage technologies. DOE expects proposed projects to be viable without direct government funding. Applicants may discuss the possibility of entering into data and/or power services agreements, providing computational resources, and other collaboration models.
Key Dates
- Sept. 19, 2025 – RFA questions due
- Sept. 26, 2025 – Industry Day (registration required by Sept. 22, 2025)
- Nov. 7, 2025 – Applications due
- Dec. 19, 2025 – Selection announcement expected
DOE Objectives
Released by DOE's Office of Nuclear Energy, this RFA (DE-FOA-0003578) follows a Request for Information (RFI) issued in April 2025 and a site selection announcement on July 24, 2025, that included land at INL. DOE's objective is to select one or more applicants with whom to enter into lease negotiations covering the full project life cycle – designing, financing, permitting, developing, constructing, installing, owning, maintaining, operating and decommissioning AI and/or energy generation infrastructure.
DOE's further objectives include supporting:
- AI and energy infrastructure priorities that 1) enhance national AI computing capacity through secure, scalable and energy- and water-efficient infrastructure, including innovative computing, cooling and power delivery/control technologies for AI training and/or inference workloads, and 2) support DOE mission priorities in science, energy and/or national security
- energy infrastructure priorities to 1) ensure an abundant supply of reliable energy is readily accessible and 2) advance the commercial readiness of domestic technologies for energy generation, distribution and/or storage
While not explicitly required, favorable consideration will be given to projects that propose new integrated AI infrastructure jointly with new nuclear energy generation. This solicitation also builds on the Trump Administration's American AI Action Plan, which emphasized accelerating AI innovation, building domestic AI-ready infrastructure and expanding energy capacity to support computing-intensive workloads. (See Holland & Knight's previous blog post, "America's AI Action Plan: What's In, What's Out, What's Next," July 25, 2025.)
Project Structure
DOE anticipates projects will include three main lease periods:
- Development (6-18 months). Establish project requirements; complete regulatory and permitting requirements, secure financing; complete design; order long-lead items; and complete other tasks required to begin construction.
- Project Construction (1-2 years). Lease period will be based on commercial best practices for constructing a project of the proposed type.
- Operation (10+ years). Operate under an initial long-term lease, with renewals considered upon formal review.
Decommissioning and site restoration/remediation will occur during a negotiated period after the end/termination of the lease agreement.
DOE outlines three potential project configurations:
- Configuration A. Integrated AI data center facilities and the associated energy infrastructure necessary to power it. Proposals are encouraged to incorporate innovative and/or on-site energy generation such as advanced nuclear and storage technologies.
- Configuration B. Phased projects that deploy a data center quickly to meet near-term commercial market compute needs, followed by later phases of additional capacity and dedicated energy generation.
- Configuration C. Projects focused solely on developing innovative energy generation, transmission or storage infrastructure. Proposals are encouraged to demonstrate a link to and/or support for potential or planned AI infrastructure development on the site, but doing so is not required.
Applicants should note that DOE will not provide funding through this RFA. Projects are expected to be commercially viable, with applicants responsible for costs associated with designing, manufacturing, constructing, operating and decommissioning. Lease consideration will primarily be in the form of cash, though applicants may propose in-kind contributions.
DOE encourages applicants to explore complementary financing opportunities with its Loan Programs Office (LPO) and Grid Deployment Office (GDO). Engagement with these offices will be independent of, and will not influence, any lease agreement under this solicitation. Holland & Knight's extensive experience with these programs can help applicants evaluate how best to pair this leasing opportunity with federal financing support.
Eligible applicants include private sector companies, data center operators and developers, energy infrastructure developers and operators, and consortia/partnerships.
Next Steps
With less than two weeks to submit questions and register for the Industry Day, interested parties should promptly review the solicitation and appendix that describes the property and site encumbrances.
Interested parties should register with SAM.gov (a requirement for eligibility that includes obtaining a unique entity identifier (UEI)), which may take up to 30 days, or confirm that their existing registration is current. Subsequently, applicants should register with FedConnect.net, DOE's application submission portal.
Holland & Knight is closely monitoring this opportunity and stands ready to assist clients in structuring projects, preparing competitive proposals and negotiating lease agreements. Please contact the authors to discuss your project.
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