Texas JETI Agreements List $138 Billion in Proposed Investment
by Will Ramirez, on Oct 12, 2026, 9:45:00 AM
For two decades, Texas’s Chapter 313 program was the state’s primary tool for landing big capital projects. When it expired at the end of 2022, lawmakers replaced it with the Jobs, Energy, Technology and Innovation Act (JETI). In 2026, that successor program reached a scale few anticipated.
For companies weighing a major Texas investment, JETI is once again the centerpiece of the state’s incentive conversation — and the current roster shows just how large the stakes have become.
Recent Program Activity: What Changed
As of September 30, 2026, the Texas Comptroller’s current-agreements table listed 21 executed JETI agreements with $138.223 billion of proposed investment — a sum of the displayed, rounded investment figures, not an agency-certified total of actual spending. Eight of those agreements belong to TeraFab AI, LLC, a vertically integrated semiconductor fabrication complex the applications describe as a Tesla, SpaceX, and xAI consortium in Grimes County; together they represent $120 billion of the total — roughly $74 billion across the Anderson-Shiro ISD phases and $46 billion across the Iola ISD phases. These figures describe proposed investment associated with executed agreements, not dollars already spent, and the roster can change as agreements are added or amended.
Other agreements on the roster reflect the program’s range. It lists Eli Lilly’s $5.7 billion medicinal and botanical manufacturing agreement in Sheldon ISD; at the company’s September 21, 2026 groundbreaking, the Governor’s office described the current Houston-area active-pharmaceutical-ingredient project as a $6.5 billion investment expected to create more than 600 jobs. The roster also includes jet-fuel manufacturing, fossil-fuel electric generation, natural-gas extraction, petrochemicals, steel, aircraft parts, gypsum products, and electronic components.
Program Overview: How the Limitation Works
For the 10-year incentive period, the standard JETI limitation sets a project’s school-district M&O taxable value at 50% of market value for eligible property; if the entire project is located in a federal Opportunity Zone, the figure is 25%. The limitation reaches eligible property rather than automatically the entire project, and it applies only to the school district’s M&O taxes — JETI does not reduce school-district interest-and-sinking-fund taxable value. A separate limitation can set M&O taxable value at 0% during the construction period. Agreements are three-party deals among the company, the school district, and the Governor’s office, with the Texas Comptroller reviewing applications.
Eligible projects include specified manufacturing, dispatchable electric generation, natural-resource, high-technology, and critical-infrastructure projects. The statute expressly excludes nondispatchable electric generation and electric energy storage. Standalone data centers should not be assumed eligible; eligibility depends on the qualifying project activities and property, although manufacturing of qualifying high-technology equipment, such as semiconductors, may qualify. That distinction is notable as artificial-intelligence demand reshapes Texas investment, since JETI is now anchoring the semiconductor fabs and dispatchable power the AI build-out depends on.
What Qualification Requires
Qualification thresholds scale with county population, from roughly $20 million in investment and 10 jobs in the smallest counties to $200 million and 75 jobs in the largest — which is why TeraFab’s multibillion-dollar phases in rural Grimes County carry a statutory minimum of only 10 jobs each. A minimum of that kind is not a forecast of operating employment. The county-based minimum job thresholds do not apply to an eligible dispatchable electric-generation facility described by the statute.
On wages, the applicant’s average annual wage for the project jobs counted in the statutory total, excluding construction wages, must exceed 110% of the applicable industry-sector benchmark, with county, then regional or statewide data setting that benchmark; the applicant must also provide the required group health-plan contribution. Applicants must post a performance bond and show that the JETI agreement is a compelling factor in choosing Texas over a viable out-of-state alternative; a project’s financial viability alone is not sufficient.
Why It Matters
JETI’s current roster shows a program capable of anchoring the largest capital projects in the country, now led in dollar terms by semiconductor manufacturing. For site-selection purposes, the benefit is substantial — a decade-long reduction in school-district M&O taxable value — but it comes with a demanding set of conditions, from the compelling-factor standard to wage, bond, and reporting requirements.
Both JETI’s investment and minimum job thresholds vary by county population, and a low job minimum is not a forecast of operating employment — a structure that shapes both the kinds of projects the program attracts and the public debate around the value it delivers.
What Companies Should Do
Companies contemplating a large Texas project should test JETI eligibility early — confirming the project falls within an eligible sector, meets the county-specific investment and job thresholds, and can be sited in a qualifying reinvestment or enterprise zone before an agreement is executed. Because the compelling-factor standard requires documented evidence of a competitive out-of-state option, that record should be built during site selection, not reconstructed afterward.
Applications run through the Comptroller’s eSystems portal and require both school-district and Governor’s-office approval, followed by ongoing compliance reporting. A project located entirely within a federal Opportunity Zone should quantify the enhanced 25%-of-market-value limitation as part of the overall package.
How SSG Can Help
Site Selection Group helps companies evaluate and secure large-project incentives like JETI as part of a competitive location strategy. We model the value of the M&O limitation against total project economics, compare Texas against competing jurisdictions, help build and document the site-selection record the compelling-factor standard requires, and coordinate with the school districts, appraisal districts, and state officials who administer the program.
Program details verified against primary sources as of September 30, 2026. Program rules, application status, and administrative guidance can change; confirm current details with the administering agency before acting. This article is provided for general information and does not constitute tax or legal advice.
