HEATED AI is guzzling gas Big Tech is paying for gas plants and pipelines to directly power data centers, threatening global climate goals. Arielle Samuelson Dec 19, 2024 And they increasingly propose keeping those projects separate from the grid, fast tracking gas infrastructure at a speed that can’t be matched by renewables or nuclear. New pipelines and gas plants, built specifically for AI The growth of AI has been called the “savior” of the gas industry. In Virginia alone, the data center capital of the world, a new state report found that AI demand could add a new 1.5 gigawatt gas plant every two years for 15 consecutive years. And now, as energy demand for AI rises, oil corporations are planning to build gas plants that specifically serve data centers. Last week, Exxon announced that it is building a large gas plant that will directly supply power to data centers within the next five years. The company claims the gas plant will use technology that captures polluting emissions—despite the fact that the technology has never been used at a commercial scale before.
Letter to Reps:
I don’t think power plants should ever exist solely to provide power to some tech company. The infrastructure needs and the living environment of the local population should always come first.