Energy Can Be America’s Secret Weapon in the AI Race
Despite multiple near deals, 2024 ended without passing legislation that would streamline America’s permitting process for infrastructure.
Despite all Americans would benefitting from increasing domestic energy production, there’s so much more this could bring to our country. The U.S. has the energy resources to meet the need of artificial intelligence data centers, but a byzantine permitting system coupled with fervent opposition to human advancement makes building infrastructure nearly impossible.
According to Wiliams, The need for change is clear. U.S. natural gas is the cleanest, most abundant, and most reliable energy source available to meet AI demand. Plus, it can act like a low-cost battery when weather dependent resources are available. However, demand for natural gas has increased 43% since 2013 while the infrastructure to support the demand has only increased 25%. Without action, the gap between demand and infrastructure will grow as AI tools become more critical to the U.S. in a competitive world marketplace. AI could drive a 160% increase in data center power demand by 2030, according to a 2024 report from Goldman Sachs.
The AI revolution will happen; the question is where will it be developed and controlled for generations to come? Infrastructure will be a critical determinant.
With our innovation and grit, it takes only six to nine months to build a natural gas pipeline safely and in a way that has little environmental footprint but at least four years to get such a project approved by government agencies. America’s permitting system is labyrinthian by any reasonable measure, requiring projects to receive duplicative approvals from dozens of federal and state agencies. There are also significant litigation risks from groups weaponizing regulatory loopholes and misusing environmental statutes to delay and cancel projects. Virtually every pipeline project encounters these costly and time-consuming delays.
