Dive Brief:
- President Biden on Tuesday signed an executive order to accelerate the development of data centers to enable AI, while also ensuring the new facilities are powered by emissions-free electricity.
- The order directs the U.S. Department of Defense and U.S. Department of Energy to lease sites for gigawatt-scale AI data centers and power generation facilities, and “to facilitate this infrastructure’s interconnection to the electric grid, fulfill permitting obligations expeditiously, and advance transmission development around federal sites.”
- Growth of AI could lead data centers to consume 9% of the United States’ electricity by 2030, according to the Electric Power Research Institute. Biden’s executive order, however, gives more subsidies to big tech companies while sending consumer power bills higher, one clean energy advocate warned.
Dive Insight:
“We will not let America be out-built when it comes to the technology that will define the future,” Biden said in a statement.
The White House wants to move quickly, expecting that within three years data centers requiring 5 GW of power may be required to train AI models, White House technology adviser Tarun Chhabra said in a call with reporters.
DOD and DOE “will select sites where the private sector can build AI data centers and clean power facilities based on those sites’ accessibility to high-capacity transmission infrastructure and minimized adverse effects,” the White House said. “After selecting sites, DOD and DOE will hold competitive solicitations for proposals to lease these sites for building, owning, and operating large-scale AI infrastructure — all at private expense.”
Developers “will be required to bring online sufficient clean energy generation resources to match the full electricity needs of their data centers,” the statement said.
To support the efforts, the Department of Interior will identify areas for clean energy that can support data centers on DOE and DOD sites while also “enhancing permitting processes” for geothermal projects, the White House said. DOE will take further steps to “promote distributed energy resources, advance siting of clean generation resources at existing points of interconnection, and support the safe and responsible deployment of nuclear energy.”
The White House said the EO prioritizes “full and expeditious permitting of AI infrastructure on federal sites” and calls for federal agencies to identify “further opportunities to support expeditious permitting at these sites, such as by applying or establishing ‘categorical exclusions’ … for infrastructure that does not significantly affect the environment.”
DOE last year finalized new and revised categorical exclusions for energy storage projects, transmission lines and solar projects, exempting eligible projects from environmental assessments or environmental impact statements.
“These efforts are designed to accelerate the clean energy transition in a way that is responsible and respectful to local communities, and in a way that does not impose any new costs on American families,” Biden said.
U.S. electricity demand could rise 128 GW over the next five years, driven by data centers and manufacturing growth, according to a December report from Grid Strategies. Electricity prices will likely continue to rise, experts say, with increasing demand an important factor.
Ben Inskeep, program director at Citizens Action Coalition of Indiana, was wary of the White House announcement on X.
The administration is “giving energy-guzzling AI data centers preferential access to siting and exclusions from bedrock environmental laws,” he wrote. “Big Tech companies get more subsidies and special treatment. Meanwhile, your utility bill goes up and the climate burns.”
