Energy Transfer LP has delivered back-to-back record financial years while executing a strategic pivot that positions the midstream giant at the center of America’s AI-driven energy boom. From 2024 through early 2026, the company posted consecutive all-time highs in adjusted EBITDA — reaching $15.5 billion in 2024 (up 13% year-over-year) and approximately $16.0 billion in 2025 — while securing over 6 Bcf/day of new contracted natural gas capacity tied to data center power generation. Executive Chairman Kelcy Warren, whose net worth climbed to $7.1 billion on the 2025 Forbes Billionaires list, has steered the partnership through a transformative period marked by major acquisitions, multi-billion-dollar pipeline investments, and an emerging role as the energy backbone for hyperscale AI infrastructure.

Record earnings and a surging distribution

Energy Transfer’s financial trajectory from 2024 into 2026 tells a story of disciplined growth hitting its stride. Full-year 2024 revenue reached $82.67 billion, climbing to $85.54 billion in 2025, while adjusted EBITDA set new partnership records in both years. Management raised its 2024 EBITDA guidance twice — from an initial $14.5–$14.8 billion range to $15.3–$15.5 billion — then delivered at the top end. For 2026, the company issued guidance of $17.45–$17.85 billion in adjusted EBITDA, implying 9–12% growth over 2025.

Distributable cash flow held strong at approximately $8.4 billion in 2024 and $8.2 billion in 2025, comfortably covering quarterly distributions that have increased every quarter. The annualized payout rose from $1.30 per unit in late 2024 to $1.34 per unit by the fourth quarter of 2025, maintaining the partnership’s 3–5% annual distribution growth commitment now in its fourth consecutive year. At a yield consistently between 7–8%, Energy Transfer remains one of the highest-yielding large-cap energy names. Warren himself has never sold a single unit, making 23 open-market purchases over the past five years — including a $35 million buy in August 2025 that brought his direct ownership to over 304 million units, roughly 9% of the partnership.

Wall Street overwhelmingly backs the story. As of early 2026, 85.7% of tracked analysts rate the stock a Strong Buy, with consensus price targets ranging from $21 to $23 against a trading price near $18.74. Units hit an all-time high of $19.22 in January 2025, and the partnership’s market capitalization has swelled to approximately $64 billion.

The AI data center strategy rewrites the growth playbook

Perhaps the most consequential development of this period is Energy Transfer’s rapid emergence as a primary natural gas supplier to AI hyperscale data centers — a business line that barely existed for the company before February 2025. The partnership has signed binding long-term agreements with some of the world’s largest technology operators, locking in decades of fee-based revenue.

The landmark deals include a February 2025 agreement with CloudBurst Data Centers to supply up to 450,000 MMBtu/day to an AI campus near San Marcos, Texas, sufficient to generate roughly 1.2 GW of behind-the-meter power for at least ten years. In October 2025, Energy Transfer partnered with VoltaGrid to fuel 2.3 GW of power for Oracle’s AI data centers, followed by direct long-term supply agreements with Oracle for approximately 900 MMcf/day across three U.S. facilities. Gas deliveries to Oracle’s Abilene, Texas data center commenced in January 2026. A 10-year exclusive deal with Fermi America covers 300,000 MMBtu/day for a planned 11 GW HyperGrid campus near Amarillo — described as the world’s largest behind-the-meter AI private grid. And a 20-year agreement with Entergy Louisiana for 250,000 MMBtu/day will support power plants feeding Meta’s hyperscale AI data center in Richland Parish through 2048.

Total contracted data center capacity now exceeds 6 Bcf/day with a weighted average contract life surpassing 18 years. The company reported advanced negotiations for an additional 350,000 Mcf/day of power plant demand in Oklahoma and is working on transactions across 13 other states. This business line transformed Energy Transfer’s growth narrative, creating a durable new revenue stream anchored in the structural expansion of AI compute infrastructure.

Multi-billion-dollar pipeline and infrastructure buildout

Energy Transfer is deploying capital at an unprecedented pace. Growth capital expenditures roughly doubled from $2.9 billion in 2024 to $4.5 billion in 2025, with $5.0–$5.5 billion budgeted for 2026 — approximately two-thirds directed toward natural gas infrastructure.

The flagship project is the Hugh Brinson Pipeline, named for Warren’s father who worked as a field hand for Sun Pipeline, a company Energy Transfer now owns. Reaching final investment decision in December 2024 at a cost of roughly $2.7 billion, this 400-mile, 42-inch intrastate line will move up to 2.2 Bcf/day from the Permian Basin’s Waha hub to Maypearl, Texas, connecting to the partnership’s sprawling pipeline and storage network. Construction was 75% complete as of February 2026, with Phase I targeted for Q4 2026 and Phase II compression additions by Q1 2027.

The Transwestern Pipeline Desert Southwest expansion represents an even larger commitment. After reaching FID in August 2025, Energy Transfer upsized the project in December 2025 from 42-inch to 48-inch diameter pipe to meet surging demand, boosting capacity to 2.3 Bcf/day across 516 miles from West Texas to Coolidge, Arizona. The estimated cost rose to approximately $5.6 billion, with completion expected by end of 2029. Arizona utilities including Arizona Public Service and Salt River Project have committed as anchor customers, driven by population growth and data center power demand.

Additional infrastructure milestones include:

  • Mustang Draw Processing Plants I and II in the Midland Basin, adding 550 MMcf/day of processing capacity by late 2026
  • Mont Belvieu Frac IX, a 165,000 barrel-per-day NGL fractionator expected Q4 2026
  • Bethel Natural Gas Storage expansion, doubling working gas capacity to over 12 Bcf by late 2028
  • Nederland NGL Export Expansion, adding up to 250,000 barrels per day of export capacity
  • A Tiger Pipeline lateral in Louisiana supporting the 20-year Entergy agreement

Across the system, Energy Transfer set volume records in nearly every segment during 2024–2025: crude oil transportation rose 25%, crude exports jumped 49%, and midstream gathered volumes climbed 10% year-over-year in Q2 2025. The partnership now operates approximately 140,000 miles of pipeline across 44 states.

Strategic acquisitions consolidated Permian Basin dominance

Energy Transfer’s acquisition spree continued to pay dividends during this period. The $3.25 billion purchase of WTG Midstream, completed in July 2024, added roughly 6,000 miles of gas gathering pipelines and eight processing plants with 1.3 Bcf/day of capacity in the core Midland Basin, plus two facilities under construction. The deal was expected to be $0.04 accretive to distributable cash flow per unit in 2025, growing to $0.07 by 2027.

Combined with the $7.1 billion all-equity acquisition of Crestwood Equity Partners (completed November 2023) and the $1.45 billion Lotus Midstream purchase the same year, Warren’s consolidation strategy added enormous scale across the Permian, Williston, Delaware, and Powder River basins. Reflecting on this approach, Warren has stated that companies “must consolidate if you’re going to make it” in the modern energy landscape. Energy Transfer also completed a successful open season on the Dakota Access Pipeline in late 2025, adding incremental volumes and extending base customer contracts beyond the mid-2030s at favorable market rates.

Sustainability and next-generation energy infrastructure

While firmly anchored in hydrocarbons, Energy Transfer has advanced several lower-carbon initiatives. The partnership signed a definitive CO₂ offtake agreement with CapturePoint in May 2024, dedicating carbon dioxide from its Haynesville gas treating facilities to a Central Louisiana carbon storage hub with capacity for up to 2 million tons of CO₂ annually. The company is developing ammonia hub infrastructure at Lake Charles, Louisiana and Nederland, Texas to serve multiple blue ammonia facilities, and has completed a pre-FEED study for underground hydrogen storage at its Spindletop salt dome facility.

Operationally, Energy Transfer’s innovative electric-drive compression technology runs on electric power approximately 80% of the time, reducing emissions by an estimated 789,908 tons of CO₂ annually. The company deploys optical gas imaging cameras at over 2,200 facilities for leak detection and reports under SASB, GRI, and TCFD frameworks.

Warren’s expanding influence beyond energy

Kelcy Warren’s personal trajectory during this period mirrors the partnership’s growth. Beyond Energy Transfer, Warren emerged as the largest shareholder in TXSE Group Inc., the parent company of the Texas Stock Exchange, holding 32.7% of non-diluted shares. The SEC formally approved the TXSE as a national securities exchange in September 2025 — the first fully integrated exchange approval in decades — backed by BlackRock, Citadel Securities, JPMorgan, and Goldman Sachs with over $270 million in total capital raised.

Warren was reappointed to the University of Texas System Board of Regents by Governor Abbott in March 2025, confirmed by the Texas Senate in May. His philanthropic footprint continued to grow, anchored by his transformative gifts to Klyde Warren Park in downtown Dallas (now drawing over 1.5 million annual visitors, with a $20 million expansion underway) and a $12 million donation to UT-Arlington — the largest in the university’s history — to advance resource and energy engineering programs. He continues to serve on the Kennedy Center Board of Trustees and was inducted into the Hart Energy Hall of Fame in 2023.

Conclusion

Energy Transfer’s 2024–2026 trajectory represents the convergence of disciplined midstream fundamentals with a transformative new demand driver. The partnership’s record EBITDA, aggressive capital deployment exceeding $5 billion annually, and data center contracts totaling over 6 Bcf/day of committed volumes have fundamentally expanded the company’s growth runway. With 2026 EBITDA guidance of nearly $18 billion, a pipeline network spanning 140,000 miles, and a distribution that has grown every quarter for four consecutive years, Energy Transfer has established itself as arguably the most diversified and fastest-growing midstream operator in North America. Warren’s strategic instinct — consolidating aggressively when peers were cautious, then pivoting early to capture AI-driven energy demand — has created a partnership that generates more than $8 billion in annual distributable cash flow while still accelerating its growth investments. The data center opportunity alone, with weighted average contract lives exceeding 18 years, provides a visibility into future earnings that few energy infrastructure companies can match.