OpenAI is building a 100,000-GPU supercluster in Norway as a major European AI infrastructure hub.

OpenAI's Stargate initiative has expanded to Europe through a partnership with datacenter builder Nscale and Norwegian industrial investment group Aker ASA to deploy a 100,000-GPU compute cluster in the Arctic by 2026. The facility will be located in Kvandal outside the town of Narvik in Norway's northern reaches, and is expected to eventually add 230 megawatts of compute capacity to OpenAI's planned Stargate compute network with the potential to add another 290 megawatts in the future. "Europe needs more compute to realize the full potential of AI for all Europeans — from developers and researchers to startups and scientists — and we want to help make that happen," OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said in a statement.

The London-based Nscale and Aker ASA are establishing the facility under a joint venture, with approximately $1 billion earmarked to bring the first 20 megawatts of capacity online. According to Aker, "The Kvandal site alone has the potential to scale tenfold in future phases as customer contracts are secured." To reach the 100,000 GPU target by 2026, the partners will need to scale rapidly—20 megawatts is estimated to support only a little more than 10,500 of Nvidia's latest GPUs.

The facility will feature direct-to-chip liquid cooling to maximize cooling efficiency, suggesting either Nvidia's Grace Blackwell or upcoming Vera Rubin rack systems will power the deployment. Power will predominantly come from hydroelectric plants in the region, while excess heat captured from the liquid cooling loops will be made available for local enterprises for applications such as district heating.

OpenAI will not be the Norwegian datacenter's sole customer. Surplus capacity will be made available to users in the UK, Nordics, and Northern Europe. OpenAI has committed to working with government officials to support sovereign AI initiatives through its OpenAI for Countries program.

The Norway expansion marks OpenAI's broader international infrastructure push. In May, OpenAI announced Stargate UAE, which will eventually house a 1 gigawatt compute cluster in Abu Dhabi with the first 200 megawatts slated to come online in 2026. Additionally, OpenAI recently announced a partnership with Oracle to supply another 4.5 gigawatts of capacity to Stargate.