Carlos Bindert

👔 Supply Chain @amazon, 🎓@RITTigers c/o 2025, former @amtrak. Big fan of $2 bills, from Chicago and living in NYC

[Carlos Bindert @CarlosBindert]

Good morning from Linden station in the northern suburbs of Chicago! Today, me and @Lamshoo_ are attempting to visit every @cta station in one day and possibly set a record — it should take around 9 hours if everything goes to plan. We’ll have more details in the 🧵below:

[Michael Girdley @girdley]

Reading 25-year-old business books is bizarre.

Especially when the author is like:

“You can see this method used at the greatest companies of our time like Enron, WorldCom, Kodak, Pets .com, and GE.”

[Michael Thomas @curious_founder]

It can now take as long as 7 years to connect a data center to the power grid in the US.

To avoid those delays, some developers are building their own power plants—and doing so in unexpected ways.

In 2024, Elon Musk's xAI was told by utilities that it would take years to connect their Colossus data center. Rather than wait, they brought in gas turbines on semitrucks and powered the first phase of the project in 4 months.

For many, this move represented all that's wrong with tech. A billionaire trucked in polluting gas turbines to a low-income community and built a dirty data center.

But to some in Silicon Valley, xAI's move was creative and inspiring. "You can just do things" is how one popular AI newsletter put it.

In 2025, dozens of similar data centers were proposed. Some are trucking in mobile gas generators like Musk did. Others are using jet engines. One company that sells engines to cruise lines and warships is supplying a few hundred MW of engines to a data center in Ohio.

When I first heard about all of this, I was skeptical. I assumed the turbine backlogs and grid delays I had been hearing about for years would throttle the ambitions of tech giants. But I was wrong.

For our latest report at Cleanview, Bypassing the Grid, we found dozens of permit documents, site plans, and equipment orders showing that many of these projects have secured their permits and equipment. Many are under construction with crews working through the night.

That means dozens of gigawatts of data center capacity could come online within the next 1-2 years. 75% of it will be powered by natural gas. If all of its built, it would be like adding five New York City's worth of power demand.

I track data centers and power projects for a living and all of this—especially the speed and scale of it—shocked me.

The full report is available on the Cleanview website linked below.

[Carlos Bindert @CarlosBindert]

In a space where everyone else is racing to the bottom, @AnthropicAI stands out with a reminder that AI should exist to help us keep thinking - not to replace what makes us human.

The poetry camera was a nice touch while waiting in line!

[sam mcallister @sammcallister]

GOOD MORNING NEW YORK CITY

COME DO YOUR BEST THINKING AT OUR THINKING SPACE IN THE WEST VILLAGE

SAY NO TO SLOP

[amanda @jailedamanda]

“what’s the song of the summer” ?? it’s DANCING IN THE DARK by bruce springsteen for the 41st year in a row

[BuccoCapital Bloke @buccocapital]

Apollo shared 40 slides on how consumers and businesses are responding to tariffs

Worth the read
https://t.co/GnYtpD32tq

[Will @SilentDawnLB]

obsessed with the minecraft movie rating curve on Letterboxd

[Carlos Bindert @CarlosBindert]

Reading this book on trade today for no particular reason…

[Carlos Bindert @CarlosBindert]

Another year of me guessing a lot of the small stuff but getting the big ticket items wrong… at least I didn’t drop the ball as much as Hulu

[Carlos Bindert @CarlosBindert]

I get that it’s the 50th anniversary show but why are we doing #SNL50 on a Sunday evening instead of Saturday night?

[Neil Renic @NC_Renic]

my unread books greeting my new book

[fran @galacticidiots]

No, using an em dash a lot isn’t a sign of AI because the em dash is not punctuation, it’s a vibe. It’s a feeling. You don’t use it because it makes grammatical sense — you use it because your heart tells you to. AI couldn’t possibly do it well because it lacks one.

[Carlos Bindert @CarlosBindert]

@whitesox there’s a reason you took guaranteed out of your stadium name

[Carlos Bindert @CarlosBindert]

idk if it’s my (eternal) new years resolution to read more and avoid brainrot, or if it’s just a really good show…

but i’m watching severance (season one yes i’m late) and it’s the first show in a while where i’m not skipping past scenes or doing other stuff in the background

[SimpleSCOTUS is yearning for democracy @SimpleSCOTUS]

TikTok v. Garland (2024)

[Carlos Bindert @CarlosBindert]

The speedrun is DONE! After a snafu with the bus between orange to pink, our final time was 9:54:59 (just under the 10hr benchmark we set); we ended at Polk.

Will have a full post mortem later; thanks for following along!

[Carlos Bindert @CarlosBindert]

Good morning from Linden station in the northern suburbs of Chicago! Today, me and @Lamshoo_ are attempting to visit every @cta station in one day and possibly set a record — it should take around 9 hours if everything goes to plan. We’ll have more details in the 🧵below:

[Carlos Bindert @CarlosBindert]

We’ve made it to Kimball, which means only three lines remain - Brown, Orange, and Pink! It’ll be a last minute decision for the route we take to end (flipping between Orange and Pink) and we’re only about 30 minutes behind schedule which is alright considering the earlier snafu.