FTAI targets 100 jet-engine power turbines for 2027 | Magica
FTAI targets 100 converted jet-engine turbines as data centers seek power
Editorial Team
••📖7 min read
FTAI Aviation is financing a planned 100-turbine production run in 2027, while ProEnergy has a 650 MW equipment order from Crusoe. Converted aircraft engines offer another supply route for data-center power, but delivery targets, affiliated financing and unproven operating economics qualify the opportunity.
FTAI targets 100 power turbines in 2027; its latest accounting notes still describe the product as precommercial.
ProEnergy has announced a 650 MW equipment order from Crusoe for delivery by summer 2027.
Crusoe also buys GE Vernova turbines, making converted engines an additional supply route in a market constrained by delivery times.
FTAI Aviation, a publicly traded owner and maintenance provider of commercial aircraft engines, is building inventory for a targeted 100 power turbines in 2027. Its third-quarter 2026 supplement shows substantial spending and customer deposits behind the plan—even as its accounting notes say the turbine has not yet been commercially launched or generated revenue.
The wager is that converting aircraft engines into stationary generators can get electricity to data centers sooner. ProEnergy, an established turbine manufacturer and power-plant services provider, has already announced an equipment contract with AI infrastructure builder Crusoe. But orders and production targets have yet to settle the comparison that matters to buyers: when usable power arrives, how reliably it runs and what it costs over years of service.
PROENERGY’s PE6000 turbine. The company announced 13 generator sets for Crusoe, with delivery expected by summer 2027. Image: PROENERGY. Source: PROENERGY.
A temporary power source with a long working life
ProEnergy's PE6000 uses an old General Electric CF6-80C2 aircraft-engine core paired with newly manufactured aeroderivative components. Conversion expands the turbine section to turn energy into shaft power rather than aircraft thrust, adds stationary supports and introduces new controls, according to an October 2025 report drawing on IEEE Spectrum's reporting of the company's approach.
That report quoted ProEnergy's commercial operations vice president as saying the company had sold 21 turbines for two data-center projects totaling more than 1 GW. The company expected those projects to need bridging power for five to seven years before grid interconnection. The customers were not named, and those statements do not establish that all the equipment had entered service.
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The timescale matters. These are years of primary electricity supply, with a possible second role afterward. ProEnergy said the units could become backup generators, be sold to a utility or supplement the grid once the original customer secured its connection. The report described standardized two-turbine blocks with generators, air cooling, emissions-control equipment and electrical systems: repurposing the core still requires a power plant around it.
ProEnergy's relevant experience predates the AI opportunity. In its September 2024 ownership announcement, it said Energy Capital Partners, an investor in energy and electrification infrastructure, had acquired a majority interest, with financial terms undisclosed. Its businesses then included a 2.4 GW fleet of contracted peaking plants in Texas, repair and maintenance for LM6000 and LM2500 turbines, and turnkey generating facilities. That combination gives it manufacturing, servicing and plant-operating experience, rather than only a supply of used engines.
Crusoe buys from both supply chains
On April 16, 2026, ProEnergy announced a contract for 13 PE6000 generator sets for Crusoe, which builds AI data centers and their power infrastructure. It specified 50 MW per set, or 650 MW in total, with delivery by summer 2027. Crusoe said the purchase was intended to provide capacity rapidly for upcoming hyperscale projects.
Crusoe's involvement reflects an established practice of pairing computing with on-site energy. In a March 2025 account of its business transition, the company described starting with modular data centers powered by stranded oilfield gas, initially for bitcoin mining, before expanding into AI workloads.
The order is a concrete customer commitment, not evidence that 650 MW is already operating. Nor should its rating be silently substituted into older reports: the October 2025 account described the PE6000 as a 48 MW machine, while the April 2026 announcement specified 50 MW. The available texts do not explain the difference.
Crusoe's procurement also limits any suggestion that converted engines are displacing conventional suppliers outright. In a July 2025 announcement, Crusoe and power-equipment manufacturer GE Vernova described orders for 29 LM2500XPRESS aeroderivative turbine packages, expected together to supply nearly 1 GW. Nineteen had been ordered in June 2025, following ten in December 2024. The companies also said the LM2500XPRESS packages were 95% factory-assembled for easier site installation. Rapid deployment and aircraft-derived turbine technology were already part of the buyer's strategy; repurposed cores offer another equipment supply route.
The 2025 report identified GE Vernova, Siemens and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries as producing the vast majority of the world's turbines. It said demand was pushing major manufacturers' backlogs beyond 2029, while ProEnergy was offering delivery in 2027. Those were reported delivery expectations at that time, rather than a current industry-wide comparison. They nevertheless explain why access to a different engine inventory could matter as much as the generator's specifications.
ProEnergy said focusing on the CF6-80C2 helped keep engineering and maintenance costs low. It also estimated that about 1,000 of those aircraft engines would retire over the following decade. That is a company forecast of potential supply, not an inventory already secured for conversion.
Company-reported figures show FTAI’s 2027 production target and customer deposits. Its quarterly filing identifies the advance as coming from J&F Power Systems, its 49%-owned joint venture. Source: FTAI Aviation Q3 2026 earnings supplement.
FTAI puts its aircraft-engine platform behind a power business
FTAI launched FTAI Power in December 2025, proposing to remanufacture CFM56 cores and add power-generation components, with production then expected to begin in 2026. The publicly traded company owns and maintains CFM56 and V2500 aircraft engines and provides maintenance, repair and exchange services to airlines and asset owners.
Its claimed advantage is access to engines, parts and maintenance capacity. At launch, FTAI cited a fleet exceeding 1,000 engines, more than one million square feet of maintenance facilities and a CFM56 production base exceeding 22,000 engines. The last figure describes engines produced, not retired cores available for conversion. Likewise, ownership of an aviation fleet is not proof that every engine is available for a power customer.
The latest supplement targets production of 100 units in 2027. Its mobile turbine is presented as providing 23 MW of continuous baseload output and 25 MW at peak. Multiplying 100 units by those ratings gives 2.3 GW of baseload or 2.5 GW of peak equipment capacity. That is the scale implied by a production target, not installed capacity or electricity already sold.
FTAI's 2026 guidance lists $250 million of power inventory working capital and $86 million of power research, development and startup costs. It also identifies $50 million of equipment and tooling investment for Power. These are investments in getting the business into production, rather than disclosed prices for customers' installed plants.
The supplement says the inventory build includes a partial offset from $234 million of customer deposits. The quarterly filing adds an important qualification: FTAI received a $234 million advance from J&F Power Systems, its joint venture with Jereh Group for packaging, testing and distributing modular generating equipment. FTAI owns 49% of the venture. That financing supports the production ramp; it is not evidence of completed deliveries or, by itself, independent end-user demand.
The next test is delivery and measured performance
FTAI is also proposing an efficiency improvement through a separate joint venture with Industrom, its partner in a planned mobile heat-recovery system. The supplement describes an optional mobile combined-cycle system that uses carbon dioxide, rather than steam, to recover exhaust heat and generate another 9 MW. It projects combined output of 32–34 MW, thermal efficiency above 50% and on-site commissioning in 14 days or less.
Those are management estimates for a design whose first units are expected to begin testing in the second half of 2027. The claim of no additional fuel, emissions or water concerns the heat-recovery addition; it does not make the underlying gas turbine emissions-free. The projected upgrade must also be distinguished from the planned simple-cycle turbine deliveries.
For buyers, the unresolved comparison is the cost and reliability of usable electricity over years of service. The order announcements provide no comparable installed prices, fuel-cost assumptions or demonstrated fleet availability for these new offerings. The next evidence buyers need is commissioned equipment meeting its promised output, maintenance and fuel requirements at a disclosed cost. For FTAI, commercial turbine deliveries and the later heat-recovery tests are separate milestones. For ProEnergy and Crusoe, delivering generator sets by summer 2027 still leaves installation and operation to establish whether the equipment resolves the projects' power constraint.
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