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Powering AI Leapfrogs Climate Concerns


These translations are done via Google Translate

It’s become clear there’s not enough low-carbon energy to satisfy data centers’ needs, and natural gas will be key.

The Constellation Energy Handley gas-fired plant in Fort Worth, Texas.
The Constellation Energy Handley gas-fired plant in Fort Worth, Texas. Photographer: Bloomberg
 

It’s Climate Week in New York, and dominating the conversation has been the apparently insatiable appetite of artificial intelligence for power.

The subject has been much in the news. Just last week, we learned that the infamous Three Mile Island nuclear plant in Pennsylvania will be restarted to supply electricity to Microsoft Corp.’s data centers.

Then Tuesday, Bloomberg News reported that ChatGPT creator OpenAI had pitched the Biden administration on its vision for massive data centers that may each consume enough power to run an entire city.

Alarmingly for climate hawks, it’s become clear there’s not enough low-emission energy — nuclear or otherwise — to satisfy AI, and natural gas will be key.

The boss of EQT Corp., America’s largest producer of the fossil fuel, said data centers will be the biggest new source of US gas demand in the years ahead.

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Data Centers Now Need A Reactor's Worth Of Power, Dominion Says
An Amazon Web Services data center in Ashburn, Virginia.Photographer: Bloomberg

Indeed, the country’s energy companies already plan a slew of new gas-fired power projects. That could complicate the energy transition and threaten President Joe Biden’s lofty goal of ridding emissions from the grid by 2035.

Meanwhile, climate hasn’t been a focus for Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris’ campaign. The US vice president even revised her stance on fracking, saying she wouldn’t ban the practice if elected.

In short, it all feels very different from four years ago, when the prospect of a Biden presidency animated environmental activists.

Of course, climate concerns haven’t been sidelined by corporations and governments entirely — witness Biden’s speeches at the Bloomberg Global Business Forum and the United Nations General Assembly in New York this week.

Yet recent days have given another reminder of how energy security (and national security, given US competition with China over AI) can leap to the top of the political and business agenda, leaving climate concerns trailing.

–Brian Eckhouse, Bloomberg News



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