Smith, TX: data center power outlook

Grid position at a glance

Serving utilities

CHEROKEE COUNTY ELEC COOP ASSN, DEEP EAST TEXAS ELEC COOP INC, FARMERS ELECTRIC COOP, INC - (TX), HOUSTON COUNTY ELEC COOP INC, ONCOR ELECTRIC DELIVERY COMPANY LLC, RUSK COUNTY ELECTRIC COOP, INC, SOUTHWESTERN ELECTRIC POWER CO, TEXAS-NEW MEXICO POWER CO, TRINITY VALLEY ELEC COOP INC, UPSHUR RURAL ELEC COOP CORP, WOOD COUNTY ELECTRIC COOP, INC

ISO / market

ERCOT (Electric Reliability Council of Texas)

Highest grid access

345 kV

Substations in county

31

Industrial retail rate

6.5¢/kWhState-level EIA-861 industrial average. The map colours by this, not by a per-county rate.

Per-utility rates in county

8 of 11 serving utilities: 5.6 to 7.6¢/kWhLowest to highest industrial rate among the utilities serving this county (EIA-861 Sales to Ultimate Customers). A spread, not the county’s rate, and it covers only the serving utilities that report one.

Interconnection queue

1 projects, 201 MW

Proposed generation

None on file (EIA-860M)Units filed with EIA as planned or under construction (Form EIA-860M). Declared intent from the federal inventory, not the interconnection queue and not guaranteed capacity.

Grid carbon intensity

734 lb CO2/MWh

Water withdrawals

46 Mgal/dAll uses, freshwater. Water already withdrawn locally, not water available for a new load.

Construction labor near site

28,499 employed in construction within ~120 km (23 of 24 counties reporting)A large build needs hundreds of skilled construction workers on site for one to three years. A county with few of them within commuting range means bussing crews in, per diem, and housing, which is real cost and schedule risk. This counts people employed in construction within about a 120 km drive (BLS QCEW), summed across nearby counties. It is not labor known to be available: most are already committed to other projects, and no public data reveals who is free.

Grid conditions in Smith

For Smith, Texas, the following sections turn public grid records into a siting-oriented summary. The highest mapped voltage in Smith is 345 kV, in the high-voltage transmission class. Smith carries 31 substations, a dense footprint across the county.

For Smith, the ERCOT market (Electric Reliability Council of Texas) is the operator that handles interconnection and capacity. The state industrial average retail rate is 6.5 cents per kWh, drawn from EIA-861 and applied to Smith at the state level rather than as a county rate. The serving utilities in Smith that publish a rate range 8 of 11 serving utilities: 5.6 to 7.6¢/kWh, a spread kept separate from the state average.

On record for Smith are 1 interconnection-queue project, totalling 200.87 MW of requested capacity. For Smith, Texas, the EIA-860M inventory shows no planned or under-construction generation, a measured absence. Grid carbon intensity for Smith, via its balancing authority, is 734.003 lb CO2 per MWh in eGRID.

USGS 2015 puts freshwater withdrawals across Smith at 45.72 million gallons per day for all uses, a measure of use, not spare supply. Within roughly a 120 km commute of Smith, about 28,499 people are employed in construction (BLS QCEW), which speaks to how far crews for a multi-year build would travel, not to labour known to be free.

Read the Smith figures as screening-grade context: they describe the surrounding grid, not a specific parcel. The numbers for Smith, Texas qualify one another, so grid access, substation density, market membership, and rate are meant to be read as a set, not in isolation. Past this screening view, siting in Smith, Texas turns on a study of a particular address, something no county-level page can stand in for. Every number shown for Smith, Texas traces to a public source listed below, with its retrieval date, so the provenance is auditable rather than asserted.

Sources