HOHHOT, China – On August 22, 2026, the fourth annual Green Computing Power (Artificial Intelligence) Conference took place on the Cilechuan Grassland in Hohhot, Inner Mongolia, drawing attention to the city’s emergence as a hub for sustainable AI infrastructure. The conference highlighted the release of the Green Computing Power Development Research Report (2026) and unveiled pilot projects such as “millisecond-level urban computing” applications. Major companies, including ByteDance and Cambricon, signed agreements worth tens of billions of yuan to develop green intelligent computing centers and token factories, signaling a major shift in where and how computing power is generated.
The question arises: why has the national computing power industry turned its focus to this remote grassland? The answer lies in the region’s unique combination of natural resources and strategic planning. Wind turbines on the grassland each generate 12 kilowatt-hours of green electricity with every rotation, but instead of feeding the public grid, this clean energy travels via a dedicated 41-kilometer line to data centers tens of kilometers away. Inside these centers, GPU arrays run around the clock, powered predominantly by wind and solar energy. This setup addresses one of the most significant challenges in AI development: the enormous electricity consumption of large-scale model training, which can exceed 100 million kilowatt-hours annually. For instance, the Hohhot Intelligent Computing Center, operated by China Mobile, spent approximately 290 million yuan on electricity in 2025, accounting for over 70% of its operating costs. Electricity costs are a decisive factor in the computing power race, and Hohhot’s strategy capitalizes on this.
Hohhot’s appeal is further enhanced by its natural climate. With an average annual temperature of just 7°C and over 200 days per year suitable for direct outdoor air cooling, data centers can save more than 20% on cooling costs. At an electricity price of about 0.36 yuan per kilowatt-hour, a large-scale GPU cluster can save around 50 million yuan annually on power expenses. Currently, Hohhot’s total computing capacity reaches 150,000 P, with green electricity usage exceeding 80%. However, the “green” aspect presents a challenge: wind and solar power are intermittent, while computing loads require a stable, 24/7 power supply. To address this, the city has implemented an innovative “computing-electricity synergy” mechanism.
China Huadian Corporation has constructed a 360,000-kilowatt integrated wind-solar-storage power station, combining 300,000 kilowatts of wind, 60,000 kilowatts of photovoltaic power, and energy storage capable of four-hour continuous regulation. A collaborative control platform collects data on wind output, solar irradiance, storage status, and computing load at millisecond intervals, dynamically allocating power: when green energy is abundant, storage systems charge and delay-tolerant tasks are prioritized; when green energy is limited, storage discharges, the public grid supplements power, and flexible tasks are deferred. This transforms power generation and consumption from a unidirectional supply model to a bidirectional interactive system.
On the consumption side, efforts to minimize waste are also underway. For example, the Hohhot data center operated by China Mobile recovers waste heat from nearby power plants to cool machine rooms. The B02 machine hall has improved its Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) from 1.315 to 1.209, saving 560,000 kilowatt-hours annually. When two machine halls are fully operational, annual savings are projected to reach 10 million kilowatt-hours of electricity and 150,000 tons of water.
Today, 62 computing center projects have clustered in Hohhot, including data centers from China’s three major telecom operators, 16 financial institutions, and computing nodes from Huawei, ByteDance, and Kuaishou. Upstream, 45 manufacturing enterprises produce servers, cabinets, and sensors locally. According to a recently published three-year action plan, by 2028 Hohhot aims to establish 10 token factories capable of producing 20 trillion tokens daily. At that time, customers will procure not only cabinets and bandwidth but also directly accessible intelligent services customized to their requirements. The prairie winds remain constant, as does the city’s commitment to converting every kilowatt-hour of green electricity into stable and reliable computing power.
