This week, Better Planet looks into the response to the soaring energy demand for data centers as tech companies add computing power to drive large-scale artificial intelligence systems. 

On Friday, U.S. Department of Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm convened a press briefing to offer some reassurances that power systems are up to the job. “Are we going to have enough energy to power AI?" Granholm told reporters. "We emphatically say yes, we will." 

Granholm listed the DOE efforts to expand clean-energy options and the transmission lines to link low-carbon power sources to data centers.  

A day earlier, Microsoft announced its latest investment in clean electricity, a partnership with Pivot Energy to install 500 megawatts of distributed solar generation in communities in 20 states over the coming five years. 

As Better Planet reported in March, the AI boom threatens to knock tech companies off track for their ambitious climate targets. Microsoft set a goal for sharp emissions cuts in 2020 but reported in May that its overall greenhouse gas emissions rose by nearly 30 percent last year, largely due to the expansion of data centers for AI. In July, Google reported a similar increase in emissions.  

Elon Musk’s new venture, xAI, is the latest tech development to raise climate concerns. Musk rapidly launched the company’s “supercluster” data center in Memphis, Tennessee, this summer, which he claims will be the world's most powerful site for training an AI model.  

But several local residents have raised concerns that the xAI facility’s enormous energy and water needs will strain regional power and drinking water supplies and add to the local community’s pollution burden. 

"It seems really sketchy," Memphis-based environmental justice organizer LaTricea Adams told Better Planet. Adams said there was little public notice or input in the xAI development. "It does appear that because this is Elon Musk, and this is a billionaire, that there was not transparency around what permitting took place." 

In climate news elsewhere, now that the vice presidential candidates are set for the two major parties, the running mates’ climate records are getting some scrutiny. 

The New York Times reported that Democrat Kamala Harris’ VP pick Minnesota Governor Tim Walz has “quietly emerged as one of the nation’s most forceful advocates for tackling climate change.” And The Washington Post had this analysis of Republican Donald Trump’s running mate J.D. Vance’s views on clean-energy jobs. 

Thanks for reading, and stay with us for the latest climate and sustainability news and analysis. Coming soon, we’ll visit an Ohio steel town to see the impact of the Inflation Reduction Act as the landmark climate law turns 2 years old. 

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