One Factory Floor, Two Booms: Baker Hughes Books LNG and Data Center Power Side by Side

The new wave of US liquefied natural gas (LNG) projects and the rush to power AI data centers are usually discussed as separate stories. At Baker Hughes, they arrive in the same order book. The company's second-quarter 2026 results, published on July 26, show record orders in its Industrial and Energy Technology (IET) segment of $7.1 billion, double the level of a year earlier, driven by strong demand across Power Systems and LNG, with what the company called "particularly strong momentum in power generation."

The same factories that make compressors for liquefaction trains also make the gas turbines that developers are installing to run data centers off the grid. It received a major award from Venture Global to provide six LNG blocks, for a total of 12 liquefaction modules, each block based on two single mixed-refrigerant modules with centrifugal compressor trains. On the power side, Baker Hughes reported two large orders tied to data centers. On July 8, it announced a multi-year agreement with Kodiak Gas Services under which it will supply about 1 GW of gas turbines and generators, delivered by 2030, with a framework for up to 1.8 GW over time.

On July 29, it announced an order from Dynamis Power Solutions for 76 NovaLT16 gas turbines with gearboxes and generators, totaling about 1.3 GW, for mobile power generation across data center projects and oil and gas applications. Together, the Kodiak and Dynamis deals represent about 2.3 GW of gas-fired generation intended largely for sites that will not wait for a grid connection. A turbine slot taken by a data center developer is one not available to an LNG project, and the reverse.

Baker Hughes' chairman and chief executive said the company had navigated "ongoing Middle East challenges" during the quarter and expected to "manage through the Middle East uncertainty" for the rest of the year.