Indiana’s utility regulator has approved the power supply for Google’s Monrovia data center on terms that put the full cost on Google. The Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission signed off on AES Indiana’s plan for two standalone battery systems of 200MW and 130MW, a hybrid project pairing 130MW of solar with 130MW of storage, and a 10 mile 345kV transmission line feeding a planned 1,200MW substation at the site. AES puts construction costs at about $1.3 billion.
The legal frame is the point. A 2025 Indiana law requires large load data centers to cover at least 80 percent of the generation and transmission costs they impose. The commission approved the project on that basis, and Commissioner Joby Jerrells noted AES’s testimony that Google will pay at least 100 percent. Local reporting cited by Datacenter Dynamics put Google’s direct connection costs at $32.3 million, with $73.8 million of network upgrades entering AES’s transmission rate base. The contract runs at least 15 years and includes provisions meant to stop costs shifting to ordinary ratepayers if Google scales back or walks away.
Google’s presence in Indiana is growing: it is also building a campus at Fort Wayne, where it bought 900 acres and committed about $2 billion in 2024, expanded in September 2025. Monrovia itself spans 18 parcels east of the town, with four large data center buildings planned.
Read against Oregon’s permit pause the same day, Monrovia shows the other route states are taking: not stopping projects, but writing the full cost of power infrastructure into the approval. Which model spreads, full cost recovery or moratorium, is now an open contest between statehouses.