The Compute 100: Chase Lochmiller, CEO of Crusoe

About this episode

Today's guest is Chase Lochmiller , co-founder and CEO of Crusoe. While climbing mountains with his best friend turned co-founder, Chase first learned about gas flares — spots around the world where energy was virtually free. In 2018, the vision was clear: co-locate small data centers next to these flares, mine bitcoin, and scale. But while Crusoe grew its mining business, Chase's core long-term motivation was a side project — using low-cost, clean energy to power compute for AI. Fast forward to 2026: Crusoe is worth over $10B, has sold its bitcoin business, and is building one of the largest data centers in the country in Abilene, TX as part of OpenAI's Stargate project. With over several…