Data Center Construction Financing: Matching Hyperscaler Lease Rights and Power Delivery Dates to Project Bond and Loan Terms

Gregory Tan, Partner, Co-Chair, Energy and Infrastructure | Paul Hastings

Gregory Tan is co-chair of the Energy and Infrastructure practice at Paul Hastings and is based in the firm’s New York office. He focuses on global finance, project development, limited recourse and structured financings, and restructurings in the energy and infrastructure sectors. Gregory represents sponsors and lenders, leading financial institutions, funds and corporations, numerous regional development banks and multilateral institutions.

• Education & Credentials

Gregory earned his LL.B. (Hons) in 1991 from The Dickson Poon School of Law at King’s College London, where he also completed his LL.M. in 1994. He is admitted to the New York Bar and has also been admitted to practice in England and Wales and in Hong Kong.

• Recognition & Leadership

Chambers USA, Ranked for Projects, 2025. Chambers Latin America, Ranked Band 1 for Project Finance, 2020-2023. Chambers Latin America, Ranked Band 2 for Energy and Natural Resources, 2020. Chambers USA, Ranked Band 2 for Projects, 2020. IFLR1000, Named a Leading Lawyer, 2020. The Legal 500 US, Named a Leading Lawyer for Project Finance, 2020. The Legal 500 Latin America, named a Leading Lawyer for Projects and Energy and recognized in Who’s Who Legal for Project Finance, 2019. Chambers Global, Recognized for Foreign Expertise in Energy and Natural Resources and Projects in Latin America-wide, 2020Recognized by Legal 500 for Banking and Finance (Financial Services Regulation)

• Professional Involvement

Gregory co-chairs the Energy and Infrastructure practice at Paul Hastings, which he joined in May 2022 as part of a three-partner projects and infrastructure team. Before that, he spent more than two decades at Shearman & Sterling, where he served as Global Project Development & Finance Practice Group Leader and Co-Head of Global Finance. His work there spanned renewables, conventional power, oil and gas, transportation, and digital infrastructure in the United States and Latin America, including the Ramones Sur Pipeline financing, the first major energy project financing to close after Mexico’s energy reform.

• Experience

Designated lenders counsel by various sponsors, including Blackstone/QTS, IPI/Stack, Blue Owl, Iron Mountain, EdgeConneX and CloudHQ, for their construction financings, structured on a “project finance” basis, of data center projects throughout the United States, Bank of America Securities, Goldman Sachs & Co., Wells Fargo Securities and Credit Agricole Securities in the $14 billion bond financing for the Related Digital/Blackstone Oracle data center campus in Saline Township, Michigan. J.P. Morgan Securities, SMBC Nikko Securities America, Goldman Sachs & Co., Wells Fargo Securities and the other initial purchasers in the $4.6 billion bond financing for the QTS Fayetteville data center project.

The note purchasers in a private placement of $1,650 million senior secured notes for 3 data centers in Virginia and Arizona developed by QTS Realty Trust. Note purchasers in the $565 million issuance of senior secured notes by QTS Irving DC3 for its 45MW critical loa data center in Dallas Metro, Texas Deutsche Bank, as lead arranger, and the lenders in the $586 million for the construction and operation of a multi-building data center with an initial critical load of approximately 252 MW in Sterling, Virginia SMBC, ING Capital, MUFG, Natixis and Societe Generale, as coordinating lead arrangers, and the lenders, in the approximately $846.5 million senior secured financing for the construction of a 67.2 MW data center building in Fulton County, Georgia being developed by EdgeConneX Blackstone Private Credit as lender to the Rio Grande LNG project in Texas.

Margarita Patria, Principal | Charles River Associates

Margarita Patria is a Principal in the Boston office of Charles River Associates (CRA), where her practice covers data centers, energy, artificial intelligence, and utility planning and procurement. Her work centers on energy economics, electricity market design, and data analytics, and she provides market design and analysis to utilities, ISO/RTOs, regulators, and other electricity market stakeholders.

• Education & Credentials

Dr. Patria holds a PhD and an MA in Economics from Boston College and a BBA in Economics from Baruch College, CUNY. She teaches a course in Energy Markets at Northeastern University and is fluent in English and Russian.

• Recognition & Leadership

At CRA, she leads multiple policy valuation projects, along with energy auctions and renewable procurements in several states, and she has advised bidders in high-stakes auctions.

• Professional Involvement

In 2026 she spoke on a panel on resource adequacy and large load growth at the Governors’ Summit on the State of PJM Interconnection in Chicago on October 8, and was a panelist on energy parks and grid headroom for AI load growth at Transition AI in San Francisco on April 13–14. She appeared as a guest on the Energy Superheroes podcast episode “Powering the AI Boom” and wrote “Grid under pressure: Flexibility-centered large load policies overlook recent lessons.” She has also authored several academic papers, and her research interests include empirical and theoretical analysis of energy markets and applied game theory.

• Experience

Her engagements include MISO interconnection reform, where she evaluated milestone payments for the generator queue backlog, and support for Alliant Energy’s distributed generation compensation proposal under Wisconsin Power & Light’s “Power Partnership” model. She has also prepared FCC incentive auction participants, including through auction simulation tools. Her ongoing work spans electricity market analysis, bid valuation, and forecasting.

Ashiq Aziz, Of Counsel, Energy & Infrastructure | Paul Hastings

Ashiq Aziz is Of Counsel in the New York office of Paul Hastings, practicing in the Energy & Infrastructure and Data Centers groups. He works on the development and financing of energy and infrastructure projects in the United States, Southeast Asia, and internationally, representing lenders, banks, syndication agents, funds, export credit agencies, and other financial institutions, as well as sponsors, borrowers, multinational corporations, governments, public institutions, and other investors.

• Education & Credentials

Mr. Aziz earned a J.D./MBA from the University of Toronto (J.D. 2016), an M.Mus from the Royal College of Music, and a B.Mus from the University of Toronto (2005). He is admitted to practice in New York.

• Recognition & Leadership

Mr. Aziz has advised leading financial institutions and public agencies in their lead roles on major energy and infrastructure financings, including MUFG Union Bank as sole syndication agent, lead arranger, bookrunner and administrative agent, Goldman Sachs as lead arranger, ING Capital as administrative agent, and U.S. DOT through the Federal Highway Administration.

• Professional Involvement

Mr. Aziz works in the Energy & Infrastructure and Data Centers practices at Paul Hastings, where his work includes construction financings for U.S. data center projects. He joined the firm from A&O Shearman, where he practiced in the Project Development & Finance group in New York. He has been admitted to the New York Bar since 2017.

• Experience

His data center work includes construction financings for multiple U.S. data centers, among them the Innovation, Circuit, Ashburn, Megawatt, Titan, Sunrise, and Manassas projects. His firm profile also features two 2026 Paul Hastings announcements on advising initial purchasers: Related Digital’s $14 billion project bond issuance for an Oracle data center campus (May 5, 2026) and QTS Data Centers’ $4.6 billion notes offering (April 21, 2026).

In energy finance, he has represented noteholders in the $750 million financing of the Nexus Pipeline System, a natural gas pipeline system of roughly 578 miles owned or operated in part by Enbridge, Inc. and DT Midstream, Inc. He also represented MUFG Union Bank as sole syndication agent, lead arranger, bookrunner, and administrative agent on a $246.5 million financing for SJ Power Holdings’ acquisition of three California generating facilities of about 523 MW.

His other generation matters include ING Capital as administrative agent on the $365 million refinancing of Carville Energy LLC’s credit facilities, Goldman Sachs as lead arranger on a Term Loan B refinancing of roughly $447 million for the 700 MW St. Joseph Energy Center in Indiana, and ING Capital and other banks on a $260 million senior secured financing for Ocean State Power LLC.

Beyond energy, he has represented noteholders and bank lenders on a roughly $200 million senior secured note issuance and roughly $90 million revolving credit facility for Tillman Networks, a nationwide wireless communications platform for first responders. He has also advised U.S. DOT, through the Federal Highway Administration, on the $87.7 million financing of Sound Transit’s Operations and Maintenance Facility East Project, and commercial and development banks on the project financing of three solar PV plants in Mexico (Don Jose, Villanueva I, and Villanueva III) for Enel Green Power, with an aggregate value of about $1 billion.

SESSION 1 – Mapping Hyperscaler Lease Delivery and Termination Rights Against Non-Recourse Data Center Project Bond and Construction Loan Terms | Gregory Tan & Ashiq Aziz | 2:30pm – 3:30pm

This hour discusses critical terms in hyperscaler leases needed to support non-recourse financings, whether in the capital markets as project bonds, whether 144A/Regulation S or private placements, or by bank and private credit lenders.. It sets out the terms and structures adopted by financiers to address a hypothetical phased hyperscale campus so that each tenant delivery deadline, termination right, LD exposure, force majeure and other customary risk allocation under hyperscaler leases are adequately addressed to enable limited recourse financing, including with springing, completion and other sponsor guarantee, , maturity, construction-period CP, mandatory redemption and prepayment trigger and/or event of default. Attendees leave able to make the intermediate call on which lease-to-debt gaps to close and which to price into the related financing, with incomplete power-delivery facts and a fixed pricing date. They also leave with a completed gap matrix and a list separating negotiable from non-negotiable estoppel, SNDA, consent and direct-agreement asks.

BREAK | 3:30pm – 3:40pm

SESSION 2 – How a Technical Advisor Tests the Power Delivery Schedule Behind a Data Center Loan | Margarita Patria | 3:40pm – 4:40pm

Power availability is increasingly one of the most significant risks in data center development and financing. This session examines how an independent advisor evaluates a proposed hyperscale campus’s path to energization, identifying the regulatory, market, utility, and project-specific factors that determine whether—and when—power can realistically be delivered.

Using examples from PJM, ERCOT, and other markets, the session walks through the layers of power-delivery due diligence: local permitting and moratoriums; state regulatory requirements; regional supply-demand conditions and resource adequacy; utility infrastructure plans and service commitments; and the feasibility of behind-the-meter generation as an interim or long-term solution.

Attendees will learn how to distinguish firm commitments from preliminary assumptions, identify red flags that could delay energization, and assess the credibility of proposed power-delivery milestones. The session connects these findings to financing decisions, including conditions precedent, reporting requirements, and milestone risk.