BlackRock NABTU partnership targets 3 million workers for AI data centers
When BlackRock’s infrastructure arm sat down with North America’s largest construction union coalition this month, the message was blunt: the AI boom is running out of hands to build it. The BlackRock NABTU partnership, formalized through a memorandum of understanding signed on August 10, 2026, is one of the clearest signals yet that Wall Street’s biggest infrastructure investors see labor, not capital, as the next bottleneck for AI data centers.
Key takeaways
- BlackRock’s Global Infrastructure Partners and the AI Infrastructure Partnership signed a non-binding MOU with North America’s Building Trades Unions (NABTU) on August 10, 2026.
- The deal targets a pipeline of over 3 million skilled trades workers for AI infrastructure and data center projects.
- NABTU brings over 1,900 apprenticeship facilities across the US and Canada into the arrangement.
- The agreement follows BlackRock’s $40 billion acquisition of Aligned Data Centers and sits alongside a separate $30 billion equity push from the AI Infrastructure Partnership.
- BlackRock’s Future Builders initiative has already committed $100 million to train 50,000 Americans in skilled trades.
BlackRock and NABTU Sign MOU to Address AI Infrastructure Labor Shortage
The core problem behind the BlackRock NABTU partnership is simple: money for AI infrastructure is arriving faster than the construction workforce needed to build it. Data centers, power plants and grid upgrades are getting funded at a pace that outstrips the supply of electricians, pipefitters and other skilled tradespeople capable of putting up those facilities. BlackRock’s Global Infrastructure Partners unit, working together with the AI Infrastructure Partnership, moved to close that gap by signing the memorandum with NABTU.
… Continue reading the full article at the original source below.
