Biden Reportedly Mulls Executive Action To Fast-Track AI Data Centers, Irking Environmental Groups
Approaching its final month in the White House, the Biden administration is reportedly considering using executive action to speed up the development of data centers needed to support artificial intelligence. The report has raised the hackles of environmental and consumer groups concerned about the adverse impacts of the data center industry’s rapid growth.
The White House has discussed invoking the Defense Production Act or using other executive actions to help data center developers overcome the energy woes that have limited their ability to keep up with an unprecedented wave of AI-driven demand, Politico’s E&E News reports, citing multiple people familiar with the discussions.
The exact details of what such executive action would entail haven't been finalized, but E&E News reported the measures could give data centers priority access to available electricity, exempt AI data centers from certain federal pollution limits and open federal land to AI data center construction. Such directives could take the form of an executive order.
The administration reportedly scheduled a meeting to discuss the measures Monday, convening senior White House staffers with top officials from the Departments of Energy, Defense, Labor and Commerce.
White House spokesperson Robyn Patterson told Politico that some of its reporting was inaccurate, but she declined to specify which aspects were incorrect.
Patterson emphasized to Politico that the administration is engaged in efforts to ensure that the infrastructure needed to support the growth of AI in the U.S. isn’t stymied by increasingly acute constraints on electricity.
“This administration is continuing to work with all stakeholders to ensure the [United States] leads the world in AI and AI data centers are powered by clean energy without raising electricity costs for consumers,” Patterson said, according to Politico.
Patterson didn't respond to Bisnow's requests for additional comment.
After decades of stagnant energy demand in the U.S., utilities have been caught off guard by a sudden surge in electricity demand that has emerged as a byproduct of the AI data center gold rush. Data center developers in major markets face wait times approaching 10 years for grid connections as utilities go through the cumbersome process of building new transmission lines, substations and power plants.
Data centers added the equivalent of a second New York City to U.S. power grids last year alone, and the demand wave is only expected to grow. Power demand in the U.S. is expected to outstrip supply as soon as next year, and utilities will need to increase their annual generation by as much as 26% by 2028 to keep pace, according to Bain & Co.
The Biden administration has come to view this increasingly acute power pinch as a threat to U.S. competitiveness on AI.
While the U.S. is by far the global leader in AI, the White House has expressed concern that infrastructure limitations on data center build-out, along with a fragile supply chain for high-powered processors, presents an economic and security risk, particularly regarding China. Officials including Vice President Kamala Harris have framed data center development as a matter of national security to ensure that “America, not China, wins the competition for the 21st century.”
Over the past 12 months, the administration has launched several initiatives to facilitate access to power for data center construction, including the White House Task Force on AI Data Center Infrastructure, which brought together leaders of firms like Microsoft, OpenAI and QTS with top administration officials.
The White House has also promoted the rapid expansion of nuclear power for data centers, with the Department of Energy encouraging the recommissioning of older nuclear plants and pushing the development of next-generation nuclear technologies like small modular reactors. Last month, the administration published a nuclear road map that aims to increase nuclear generation in the U.S. by 35 gigawatts by 2035.
But news of the Biden administration’s potential executive actions set off alarm bells this week for a range of environmental and consumer advocacy groups that have expressed concerns about the environmental impacts of the data center boom and the vast amounts of energy needed to fuel it. Roughly 60% of the new electricity generated to serve data centers over the next decade is expected to come from fossil fuels.
Internet-focused activist group Demand Progress decried the potential measures as a gift to powerful Big Tech interests with little benefit to the public. Emily Peterson-Cassin, the nonprofit’s director of corporate power, pointed to projections that the firms building data centers won't end up paying their fair share of the massive costs that come with expanding grid infrastructure to serve them, ultimately driving up prices for consumers.
In a statement, Peterson-Cassin questioned why the Biden administration would risk the potential economic and environmental toll of data center expansion to support AI technology that has yet to prove its value to society.
“The Biden administration keeps racing to give away our land, our water and our power to Big Tech and Big Energy executives while the American people remain on the sidelines,” she said. “The White House needs to slow down, stop listening only to Big Tech executives betting on a Wall Street payout and hear from everyday Americans who have seen their energy and water costs skyrocket when gigantic data centers are built in their communities.”
Other objections to the White House’s reported plans have come from local groups opposed to the proliferation of data center development in their communities. A wave of organized local pushback to large-scale data center development has emerged over the past three years as the data center industry’s growth has increasingly pushed new projects into rural or residential communities that previously had few such industrial facilities.
One of the most prominent of these groups, Virginia’s Coalition to Protect Prince William County, expressed dismay at the potential executive action, which it said continued the trend of prioritizing data center construction over the well-being of regular citizens.
“This is NOT a partisan issue. This is about how citizens have a right to have our voices considered when this kind of industrialization impacts our communities, our homes, our natural and historic resources, AND our pocketbooks,” the group wrote in an email to supporters. “What happens when those regulations are removed? Data Centers and their power needs inch closer and closer to your homes, to your rights to clean water and to clean air.”
