Massive Demand.

Not enough juice.

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1. The Looming Power Crisis (1):

U.S. electric utilities predict a tidal wave of new demand from data centers powering technology like generative AI, with some power companies projecting electricity sales growth several times higher than estimates just months earlier.

Nine of the top 10 U.S. electric utilities said data centers were a main source of customer growth, leading many to revise up capital expenditure plans and demand forecasts, according to a Reuters analysis of company earnings reports from the first three months of the year.

During the same earnings period last year, only two of the companies mentioned data centers.

Overall, power use from the thousands of giant computing warehouses that comprise data centers is expected to triple globally from less than 15 terawatt-hours (TWh) in 2023 to 46 TWh this year, according to Morgan Stanley research.

"The truth of the matter is these things (data centers) are pigs when it comes to energy use, and now they're the size of an elephant," said Eric Woodell, an expert who specializes in data center operations. (Source: reuters.com, italics/bold mine)

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2. The Looming Power Crisis (2):

U.S. technology companies are pursuing energy assets held by bitcoin miners as they race to secure a shrinking supply of electricity for their rapidly expanding artificial intelligence and cloud computing data centers. Those data centers are driving the fastest U.S. power demand growth since the start of the millennium, outpacing grid expansions and leaving giant technology companies, like Amazon and Microsoft to scavenge for vast amounts of electricity.

Data centers could use up to 9% of total electricity generated in the U.S. by the end of the decade, more than doubling their current consumption, as technology companies pour funds into expanding their computing hubs, the Electric Power Research Institute said in May. (Source: reuters.com)

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3. The immense energy demands of data centers will likely require building natural gas-burning power plants, solar and wind farms and perhaps small nuclear reactors, said the new chief executive of American Electric Power Co. “It’s a jigsaw puzzle,” Bill Fehrman said in an interview. “We just have to challenge ourselves on how we can serve all this load and continue to make progress on our climate goals.” Fehrman, who assumed AEP’s top job on Thursday, joins the company as utilities worldwide scramble to meet rising electricity demand from the data centers that enable artificial intelligence. AEP, based in Columbus, Ohio, expects data centers to increase its own power load 42% by 2030. (Source: bloomberg.com)