Texas
Texas exhibits metabolic dominance: 43% of US oil production, 34 bcf/day natural gas, plus 66,000 MW renewables powering a $2.77T economy—8th largest nation equivalent.
Texas operates as America's energy metabolism, processing and distributing the hydrocarbons that power the national economy. The state produces 43% of US oil—5.8 million barrels daily in 2025 at record pace—while its 34 billion cubic feet per day of natural gas leads the nation. One-third of America's crude refining capacity sits in Texas, with one-fourth of all operable refineries. This concentration makes the $2.769 trillion economy the nation's second-largest, equivalent to the world's eighth-largest nation ahead of Canada, South Korea, Russia, and Australia.
What makes Texas distinctive is not just extraction but adaptive radiation into every energy form. The state set a goal of 10,000 megawatts renewable capacity by 2025 and exceeded it in 2009—mostly through wind farms that now contribute to nearly 66,000 megawatts of utility-scale renewable capacity. Meanwhile, data centers and AI are driving projected energy demand to nearly double by 2030, creating new pressures on ERCOT's independent grid.
The technology sector compounds energy dominance. Tesla, Oracle, Apple, and Hewlett Packard have relocated to Texas, which now claims the second-largest semiconductor workforce nationally. Site Selection magazine ranked Texas #1 for business climate for two consecutive years. Initiatives like the Texas CHIPS Office and Texas Energy Fund signal a state positioning itself not just as hydrocarbon hub but as the center of American industrial production for the next generation—a metabolic powerhouse that consumes resources and capital to generate outsized economic output.