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AI Data Centers Build Their Own Power Plants Because the Grid Isn't Ready
Desperate for Electricity
The Wall Street Journal reports AI Data Centers, Desperate for Electricity, Building Their Own Power Plants
In West Texas, natural-gas-fired power generation is under construction as part of the $500 billion Stargate project from OpenAI and Oracle (ORCL). Gas turbines are in use at Colossus 1 and 2, the massive data centers Elon Musk's xAI is building in Memphis, Tenn. More than a dozen Equinix (EQIX) data centers across the country are using fuel cells for power.
With the push for AI dominance at warp speed, the "Bring Your Own Power" boom is a quick fix for the gridlock of trying to get on the grid. It's driving an energy Wild West that is reshaping American power.
Most tech titans would be happy to trade their DIY sourcing for the ability to plug into the electric grid. But supply-chain snarls and permitting challenges are complicating everything, and the U.S. isn't building transmission infrastructure or power plants fast enough to meet the sudden surge in demand for electricity.
Data centers have long taken power for granted, said KR Sridhar, founder and chief executive of Bloom Energy (BE) which provides fuel cells to companies that need on-site power, often in a hurry. "You build the data center. Well, you just plug it in."
That isn't possible anymore given the city-sized amounts of electricity needed to train AI models. One data center can devour as much electricity as 1,000 Walmart stores, and an AI search can use 10 times the amount of energy as a google search.
President Trump in January declared a national energy emergency, in part to keep the U.S. from falling behind China in the AI race. He has issued a series of related executive orders including one that aims to fast-track data-center construction and needed power infrastructure.
China will invest twice as much as the U.S. this year in power plants, storage and the grid, according to the International Energy Agency. It added about 429 gigawatts of new power generation last year, according to the think tank Climate Energy Finance, while the U.S. built about 50 gigawatts.
In some locations, data centers won't be able to plug into the power grid until the 2030s because of the sheer backlog of projects and the fact that the nation's high-voltage electric wires are running out of room.